Her Head v Her Heart
by Queen of Kaos
Summary: When Trish Stratus ended her relationship with Dave Batista, her head said it was the right thing to do. Now that she's moving on with a new Superstar, her heart is disagreeing. TrishDave, TrishCena
1. Laughable, Likeable, Layable, Lickable

**Her Head v. Her Heart**

_A/N: I totally wasn't going to start this story until I had finished The Emancipation, but I wanted to get it out there and see what y'all thought. This story is for anyone who read my other story and was disappointed by the twist. If you haven't read it - I don't want to give anything away. If you have - you know what I'm talking about. As always, I don't own 'em, or much else for that matter. Enjoy. And send reviews - I love them.

* * *

She could feel his eyes on her from across the room. It was the same heavy gaze he had always given her before – before she had left him with no explanation and no apology. Before she had made up some bull shit excuse about needing to figure out what she wanted for herself. Before she walked away from his bed and straight into the arms of someone else._

He knew that she knew he was watching her. He could see her sneak a peak every few minutes, smiling guiltily as she wove her arm tighter through the man at her side's. He knew that he shouldn't care about her anymore, not after the way she had broken his heart without so much as a "let's be friends." He knew that he shouldn't be watching, but he couldn't help it.

Being in this place, with all of them, made him think of that night – their first night. It took him back to the night that started all of his dreams and nightmares. The greatest, and worst, night of his life.

_June, 2004_

"_You are so totally blind," Lita shrieked as Trish tapped two fingernails on the top of the bar table. _

_It was unusual for a large group of the RAW wrestlers to hang out together after a house show. But since they had the following four days off, Trish had decided it was time to party. She had invited Lita, Matt, and Jericho. Chris invited Stacy to hang out. Stacy, who everyone knew was crushed out on the Legend Killer, in turn, invited Randy. He had invited Evolution. Ric begged out for some reason or another, but Dave and Hunter had agreed to tag along. _

_Batista wasn't known for smiling much, but watching the three girls around the table argue over some code or language that none of the guys understood, was entertaining, to say the least. And it was better than just sitting and watching some fake-assed stripped wriggle all over him for fifty bucks. _

"_Li, he's totally not a three," Trish insisted, draining her second beer bottle and motioning for the waitress to bring another. When the girl, who appeared to be in her early twenties, with long, blonde hair and a tight tee shirt sat the bottle on the table, Trish winked at her. "She's more "three" material than he was," she informed her friend._

_Clearing his throat, Matt leaned back in his chair and rolled his eyes toward Hunter, who was visibly confused. "Fine, I'll ask," he said, draping one arm across the back of his girlfriend's chair. "Lita, dear?" She turned her eyes to him and leaned her elbows on the table. "What the hell is going on?"_

_Stacy smiled at the other women, Trish winked, and Lita sighed. "We have a rating system," she admitted reluctantly. "But if we tell you guys about it, the secret's totally out of the bag and I don't know if we can use it anymore," she bit her lip and looked to the girls. "What do you think?"_

"_You totally can't throw out something like "we got a rating system" and then not tell us," Randy exclaimed, leaning back in his own chair and drinking from his beer bottle. He cast his blue eyes at Stacy and winked. "Come on, baby. You know you want to tell me."_

_Throwing a pathetic "save me" look at Trish, Stacy withered. She could never say "no" to Randy, and he knew it. "It's not like they don't do the same thing," she shrugged._

_Trish rolled her eyes and looked each of the men in the eye. "Okay, but there's one rule," she held up a finger. "When we tell you what the system is, no one is allowed to ask where they fall within it." She looked at them each again. "Understand?"_

_All of the men nodded, though no one actually believed that they would hold up their end of the bargain. "Alright," Trish said, leaning forward on her elbows. "The girls and I, we have a lot of down time on the road, so we talk about a lot of shit," she started. "And one day, we decided that we needed a ratings system – like you guys use the whole 1 – 10 thing, right?" _

"_I have never rated a girl 1 – 10 in my life," Jericho defended, holding up a hand for her to stop with that accusation right away._

"_What the fuck ever, Jericho," Lita accused. "You sat on our couch a week ago and called Katie Holmes a fuckin' nine and a half," she pointed._

_He seemed to strain to remember and then smiled. "Oh, yeah."_

_With another roll of her eyes, Trish spoke again. "So, we decided we didn't need ten – just four. Every person on the face of the planet, regardless of sex, race, religion, nationality, or orientation fits into one of four categories." She spoke with the authority of an expert, as though she was daring any of them to challenge her. "We call 'em the four "L"s."_

"_Well?" Hunter asked as Trish turned her eyes to him. "What are the categories?"_

_Lita cleared her throat and grinned madly as she leaned further forward. "The first one is "laughable." As in the kind of person you would never, EVER, in your worst nightmares, want to sleep with. No sexual attraction whatsoever."_

"_That's so mean," Matt laughed._

"_It has nothing to do with personality. It doesn't mean their bad people," Stacy added. "I mean, they could be really great friends, but you just don't wanna wake up hung over and naked with them," she explained. When they all looked at her, she cleared her throat and took a drink of the beer Randy had just bought her. "The second category is "likeable," mostly because we couldn't think of a better name for it," she said after swallowing her drink._

"_Likeable? That doesn't sound so bad," Jericho interjected._

_Trish shook her head. "It's not bad. It just means they're the kind of people that, while not repulsive, you're not picturing naked all damn day," she answered. "They're the people that don't make you want to vomit on impact," she added, throwing a knowing look to Stacy and Lita, who just laughed._

"_Wait a minute – who are you guys thinking about?" Matt asked immediately. He had been around the three of them enough to know when there was an in-joke he wasn't getting._

_Lita just shook her head and waved her hand, lowering it to his thigh. "The third category is "layable" or the people you'd definitely sleep with if you had the chance, and some protection," she winked at Matt, who just beamed at the rest of the table. _

"_Oh, that's definitely me," Jericho said proudly, tipping the waitress as she brought another drink. "And you, too, Precious," he winked at her as she walked away, confused._

"_So what else is left?" Randy asked Stacy. "I mean, you got the people you wouldn't sleep with, the people you would if you were drunk or somethin', and the people that you would definitely bang. What's the fourth category?"_

_She blushed wildly and looked at the other girls to save her. But all she got were two wide-eyed looks of mock innocence. "I don't remember, Lita," Trish said._

"_Hmmm," Lita squinted as she strained her memory. "Must have slipped my mind, too, Trish. Stace, help us out here," she wiggled her eyebrow and watched as Stacy stared at the table. _

"_Lickable," she muttered under her breath._

"_What was that, Stace?" Hunter asked, leaning across Orton to hear her better. "I didn't catch that."_

_She looked into his eyes and rolled her eyes. "It's lickable, okay? The fourth category is lickable." _

_Randy reached under the table and squeezed her knee, leaning his shoulder close to hers. "What's "lickable" mean, Stace?" he whispered in her ear._

_She blushed even deeper as Trish finally took pity on her. "Lickable are those people that make you all tingly on sight."_

"_Kane makes me tingly on sight," Matt had breathed, drawing shocked looks from Lita and Stacey. "He scares me," he admitted and then his eyes grew wide. "But that's not what you meant, is it?"_

_Lita laughed out loud and then leaned back in her chair. "They're the guys, or girls, I guess, that make you think all those dirty thoughts you don't want anyone to know you think?" she suggested to the group. Every guy at the table got all cloudy-eyed for a moment, imagining all the "lickables" that they could._

"_Alright," Trish sighed. "Before the chairs get all sticky, maybe we should change the subject," she suggested._

"_Awe, no," Matt stated firmly, his hand on Lita's back. "Which category am I in, baby?" he asked her._

_Lita shook her head in defiance. "Did you not sit right here, Matt Hardy, and agree, with everyone else, not to ask that very question before we ever started this mess?" He shrugged and let his eyes droop, looking at her through long lashes. "Not the puppy dog eyes." She turned to Trish for help._

_She cleared her throat and sat back. She loved her friends, but watching them crumble under the power of the men in their lives was funny to her. Not for the first time, she thanked the heavens that she wasn't so weak. "Anyway, we got Badd Blood comin' up soon," she tried to change the subject._

"_Not gonna happen, Stratus," Jericho shook his head and sat his beer bottle on the table. With his arms crossed over his chest, he dared her to tell him "no." She just raised her eyebrow. "You knew full well that everyone was going to want to know where they fit in your little rating system. Spill," he commanded._

_Trish rolled her eyes and then smiled, nodding her head toward him slightly. "Fine," she responded, leaning her shoulder toward Lita. "Lita, baby, I think you are totally, completely lickable," she growled as Lita moved toward her with the same deviant look on her face._

"_That's not what I meant," Jericho pouted as the two girls laughed and moved apart._

"_Jericho, ya dick head," Hunter chided, throwing a peanut at him from the bowl in the center of the table. "Ladies," he pointed to Trish and Lita, "Feel free to continue what you were doing before you were so rudely interrupted by Y2Jack Off here," he encouraged._

_But the peanut missed its mark, hitting Stacy instead. She picked it off of her tee shirt and tossed it back before turning to her friends. "What's it gonna hurt?" she asked._

_Trish shrugged. "Alright, fine. But it's only fair to warn you that we hardly ever agree on anything," she explained. "I mean, the three of us have totally different tastes, so don't get all pissy if one of us didn't think you're the shit or whatever."_

_All the men agreed as Lita went first. "Well, Matty, you know I think you're totally lickable, baby," she winked as he leaned over and kissed her quickly. "Chris, you're layable, totally. Randy, you're a little too GQ meets Abercrombie for me, but I'd have to put you in the layable category as well – can't deny a guy with those tats, can I?" He winked in appreciation as she turned her attention to the other two Evolution members at the end of the table. "Hunter, when you're hair was longer and you were sportin' DX attitude, you were totally lickable to me. You've fallen, my friend," she shook her head sadly, "into the realm of the layable, as well." Her eyes fell on Batista, who had yet to speak during most of the evening's proceedings. "Dave, we argue over you more than anyone on the roster," she sighed._

_He wasn't sure if it was a compliment or not, but he noted that all three girls were nodding their heads in agreement. He could see Orton and Hardy wriggle uncomfortably as the women they were with seemed torn over the big man at the head of the table. "And?" he finally asked._

"_I hate to say it, man, because you're one of my favorite people to have around," she cringed and bit her bottom lip. "But I can't really make you layable or lickable because I'm afraid you'd tear me in half if you gave it to me half as rough as I like it," she admitted. He smiled as she told him he had to be likable for her._

_Stacy watched as all eyes turned to her. "Why do I have to go next?" she asked with a pout. Randy's hand found it's way to her back and she smiled at him. "You are so lickable and you know it, so don't even give me that look," she warned. He smiled as Hunter smacked his back in congratulations. "Unlike my friend here," she pointed her thumb toward Lita, "I find men in nice suits far more attractive than rock stars. So Hunter and Dave, you guys are totally layable to me." Turning to her left, she grinned at Chris, who was leaning toward her in anticipation. "You're layable, too," she conceded with a roll of her eyes. "Matt," she shrugged and raised her eyebrow. "You're smaller than the guys I usually go for, ya know? But I wouldn't rule anything out – you've got that undeniable attitude that makes all girls kinda weak in the knees. I guess you're layable, too," she finally shrugged._

"_Thanks, Stace," Matt accepted her compliment. "But, for the record, it's known as Mattitude," he corrected._

_Lita grabbed a peanut from the bowl in front of them and threw it at her boyfriend. "You're a jack ass," she laughed as he tossed the offending nut back at her._

_Trish watched all of the men around the table and thought about her answers. She wasn't as sweet as the other two. She knew for a fact that Stacy found Matt Hardy anything but layable. And she knew that Lita was repulsed by Orton's frat boy appearance. She wasn't sure she could lie, just to spare their feelings._

"_What about you, Stratus?" Jericho asked finally._

_Trish shrugged as Randy shot her that million dollar grin. "Trish'll lick anything that moves," he teased her. She stuck her tongue out, and then seemed to realize, along with the rest of the table, that her gesture only proved his point._

_She was saved from having to say anything as the waitress returned to the table and informed them that it was last call and they needed to start heading out for the night._

Dave watched Trish now, a year later, as she snuggled close to Cena at the table of the same bar. That night, after they had all gone back to the hotel, she had caught an elevator with him and informed him that, out of everyone at the table, he was the only one she found remotely lickable. She went into detail about how she had named the category after him, after seeing the tattoo on his back for the first time.

They had gone back to his room, and it had been the start of something beautiful. At least, it had been for him. Until she broke his heart and then left him to pick up the pieces. He didn't want to pine for her, to spend nights in restless sleep, thinking about how he hadn't been good enough for the woman he thought he was going to spend his life with, but it seemed out of his control. He could put on the stoic face, even give her a smile when they passed in the halls of the arena or hotel of the moment. But inside, it hurt him like hell to watch her with anyone else. Inside, the animal was rattling the bars of its cage, and he was afraid what would happen once that animal was unleashed.


	2. Body, Soul, Mind, Spirit

**Her Head v. Her Heart**

**(Caution: This chapter contains sexual content.)**

_A/N: I'm gonna be honest with you guys - the first chapter of this story is not, in my opinion, anywhere close to the best thing I've written. I'm okay with it, since I felt like it had the humor that The Emancipation is missing, so I'll be proud of that. But I promise you, it will get better. I drew up an outline today, and now I have a direction, so that's a plus. And mybest friend in the whole world, Arykah, decided to challenge me a little bit further, as well. So I am now going to try to work at least one quote from my out-of-control,off-the-wall, completely randomfriends, into each chapter of the story. The first chapter was easy,because I just wrote out what we (me, Arykah, and our friend Liv) talked about during Wrestlemania this year. I told them that I couldn't explain why I thought Batista was so fuckin' sexy - I just knew he had that certain "something" that made me want to lick him every time I saw him come to the ring - either in a suit, or his ring attire. We were a little drunk, and the rest of the chapter came out of that._

_Afterdeveloping an actual outline, though, I think it'sgonna be a harder challenge tomeet, especially in chapters like this one. I managed to do it this time- and I **will** do it in the rest, even if it kills me. Just in case I run out of crazy shit, though, feel free to send me some random-ness from you and your friends, and I'll try to work it in, too. Here's the catch - it has to be something you guys came up with on your own, because I don't want shit that someone was paid to write (like in a script or a book). When I use your line, I'll give you credit - for sure._

_Also,I have no idea who Trish is going to end up with in this story. It's a fifteen-chapter story, and I have everything planned up through fourteen. After that, it's up to you guys. Let me know who you think she should be with, and I'll go with the popular vote. Because Kaos-Land is nothing if not democratic, even if I call myself the Queen. _

_Finally, I don't own Batista, Stratus, or Cena - as per usual, I'm just using them for my own entertainment and pleasure. And happy belated birthday to TrishOrton. Thanks for all your support. And everyone else who keeps stroking my ego and encouraging me to soldier on, you guys rock, hard-core style! I promise, I am now done yammering - on with the story._

_

* * *

_

_Anticipatory beads of sweat coursed down her neck, caught the flickering light, and began to pool in the hollow of her throat, as his strong hands gently laid her bronzed body against the cool satin sheets. He rested his weight on his elbows as he hovered above her and stared beyond the depths of her dark, desire-clouded eyes. The muted glow from the bedside candles caught the shimmer of her hair, causing a stark contrast between her golden locks and the blood red color of the fabric. _

_With trembling fingers, she clutched the back of his head, eliciting a hungry growl from the back of his throat as he dipped his head and ran the tip of his tongue from her throat to her chin. Plunging past her lips, into the recesses of her mouth, his kisses probed her deeper and deeper, until she felt herself beginning to fall. Trish sank her nails into his back as she arched hers and begged him to devour her. No one had ever touched her like he did, with expert motions that awakened an animal which had laid dormant in her core for so many years._

_As his steady, confident hands slid down her sides, she felt the goose bumps on her arms standing at attention. As he ran a calloused palm over her smooth stomach, a moan she couldn't control escaped her lips. As he moved his lips to her collarbone, and his touch to her hip, she squeezed her eyes shut and bit her lip, determined not to cry out before he had even entered her. _

_He continued to explore her with one hand as he raised his head and watched the pleasure contorting her beautiful features. She gasped for a quick breath, her chest rising and whispering a suggestion of a touch against his, sending a million tingling echoes up and down his spin in its wake. The slightest hint of her tongue peeked out and touched her lips, retreating before he could capture it as she returned to biting back her pleasure. _

"_Let it go, Baby," he whispered before his lips enveloped her ear and his tongue circled the lobe slowly. She growled and thrust her hips against his hand desperately._

_He withdrew his fingers sharply and then placed both hands on the sides of her face, meeting her hips with his and filling her instantly. She cried out, tears forming in the corners of her tightly clenched eyes and he brushed the blonde locks from her skin, running his thumb slowly over her bottom lip. To feel her, pained by the pleasure only he could give, made him feel one hundred times more masculine than any title or any match would ever be able to accomplish._

_She began to tighten around him and he slowed his pase, despite her groans of protest. "Open your eyes, Trish," he encouraged. "Look at me, Sweetheart," he added. She shook her head, and gasped, as he thrust hard and fast and then pulled back again. "I want you to see me."_

_Trish opened her eyes and smiled into the face that seemed to know her so well, inside and out. She took in every dark, handsome feature – from his probing eyes to his chiseled cheeks to the little patch of hair leading from his lip to the end of his chin. Everything about Dave Batista was forever etched into her mind. And she couldn't let it go._

"Damn, Girl," John grunted as he finally rolled off of her and blinked at the ceiling, his chest rising and falling in a heavy pattern that mirrored Trish's as she gasped for breath and tightened a sheet around her naked body. "You are gonna fuckin' kill me someday." He rolled his head to the side and winked when he caught her eye. "Or kill me fuckin'."

She laughed and placed a quick kiss on his full lips, before brushing her sweat-matted hair from her face, and resting her head on his chest. She knew it was wrong – fantasizing about one man while lying with another, but her body wouldn't respond to anyone like it had responded to Dave. No matter how enthusiastic, or athletic, or adventurous John was, he wasn't Dave. It wasn't that he was bad – by most standards, he was fuckin' great. And Trish knew that, had she met him first, she would have considered him the best she'd ever had. But she'd had Dave – the man who was mind-blowing and body-numbing on a bad day.

Since she was a little girl, Trish had always believed that she would meet a man whom she could love with her body, soul, mind, and spirit. Instead, fate's fucked up sense of humor gave her body and mind to one man, and her soul and spirit to another. She didn't know how, or if she would be able, to ever reconcile the two. But, as she felt John's body rise and fall with the rhythm of peaceful sleep, she realized that she was okay with the arrangement fate had given her. As long as neither Dave, nor John, ever found out what hid in the darkest corners of her mind.

* * *

_Credit for this chapter's challenge line goes to my chica, Olivia Dawn, who once told me that her girlfriend was going to fuckin' kill her, or kill her fuckin'. In the next chapter. . . Batista and Trish finally have a conversation - and you get to find out what the hell Trish was thinkin' when she left him high and dry. Oh, the suspense._


	3. Past Passion, Present Pain

**Her Head v. Her Heart**

_A/N: Thanks again for the reviews. I'm glad you guys are diggin' this. I fully intended to post another chapter in The Emancipation first, but this one came to me a little easier than that one did. So tomorrow, you will get another chapter in that story, but for now - here ya go. I don't own anyone mentioned in this story or their characters. Y'all know that. Also, I don't know if there is a universal training facility for the WWE in Stamford, but for the purposes of this story - there is._

* * *

"You guys, come on," Stacy begged as she, Lita, and Trish headed out of the women's locker room and toward the parking lot of the company's Stamford training facility.

"Sorry, Stace, but me and Edge are heading up to Manhatten tonight. He wants to catch some alone time before everybody starts gettin' into town tomorrow," Lita explained, holding the door for Stacy and Trish.

All three women squinted against the sun and slid designer glasses over their eyes. "I'm supposed to help John pack tonight," Trish explained. With a roll of her dark eyes, she huffed. "I swear to God, you guys, if they didn't keep that belt locked up for him, he would forget to take it to the arena most nights. I have never, in my life, seen anyone pack the way that boy does."

Stacy stared at both of the other women in disbelief. Lita's eyes were scanning the near-empty parking lot, and Trish seemed to be in some happy-go-lucky la la land. It was weird to see Trish so happy all the time. And it was throwing Stacy's world into a bit of upheaval. "Well, I never thought I'd see the day either of you begged out of Girls' Night," she stated, a hint of bitterness in her voice.

Lita located Edge's car, speeding into the lot and heading straight for them. "I never thought I'd see the day you begged in," she stated distractedly, shooting a smile and a wave at her new boyfriend. With a quick hug, she said good-bye to her friends and took off.

Trish bit her lip and considered Stacy's sad demeanor. Her break-up with Randy had been hard on her, and Trish really did feel bad. There was a sick sense of guilt in her gut that poor Stacy, who had never been anything but loving and loyal to her man, was ditched by a lying, cheating womanizer, while Trish, who had never really tried to stay faithful to anyone, had her choice of two great guys. "Sweetie," she started.

The loud sound of "My Time Is Now" filled the air, as Trish blushed as she reached into the front pocket of her gym bag. Her cell phone was blinking wildly as her boyfriend's single blasted from it. "Hey, baby," she answered, reaching out an arm to keep Stacy at her side.

"Hey," John yelled over what sounded like bad techno music and cat calls.

Trish put a finger in her ear and strained to hear him. "Where are you?" she asked.

He laughed as the sounds of the ruckus faded. "Sorry about that," he cleared his throat. "Um, Chris wanted me and Randy to check out some lunch buffet at this strip club," he answered, a slight tone of apology in his voice.

"Oh, nice," Trish laughed. Stacy was watching her, but she couldn't wipe the stupid grin off her face. John always made her smile. "So, is it any good? The buffet?"

"Nothin' better than what I got at home, baby," he said, his voice turning serious.

She hated when he got serious. "Nice save, Romeo," she started, as Stacy began to fidget. "Did you just call to tell me I'm hotter than a bunch of strippers, or was there some other reason for this check in?"

"Um, yeah." He hollered something off to the side and she wondered for a moment if he had forgotten about her. "Sorry, baby. Randy's eating his lunch of some chick's stomach. It's entertaining. Anyway, have you left the gym yet?"

"I'm in the parking lot," she said. The thought of Randy with a stripper made her angry as she watched Stacy sadly talking to someone on her phone, just a few feet away. He was one of John's closest friends, and he wasn't a bad guy. She didn't mind having him around. She just felt guilty for liking him, after everything her own friend had gone through.

"Great," John said happily. "Can you run down to my locker and grab my IPod? We kinda left in a hurry and I kinda forgot it," he trailed his sentence off at the end.

Trish rolled her eyes again. He always kinda forgot something. "Sure. I'll just leave it on the kitchen counter if you're not home."

"You don't have to make a special trip," he assured her. "Just bring it with you when you come over tonight."

Stacy snapped her cell phone shut and let out a string of expletives, causing Trish to jump a little. "Ya know what, Sweetie? You're kinda on your own tonight. Me and Stace are havin' Girls' Night."

Stacy's wide eyes seemed to fill with a smile for the first time. She mouthed "really" and Trish nodded, giving her friend a wink. "Tonight?" John asked into the phone, his disappointment evident.

"John Felix Anthony Cena," Trish stomped her foot and spoke sternly. "You are twenty-eight fuckin' years old. If you can't pack your own damn clothes for a four-day road trip, then you don't deserve to have clean underwear every day," she ranted.

"Woah, woman!" John laughed. "Where did that come from?"

She grinned sheepishly and turned away from Stacy. "I don't know. Baby, look, I'm sorry. I know we had talked about spending tonight together before everything got all hectic and crazy, but Stace needs me." She took a deep breath. "We could use a designated driver, ya know?"

But he laughed and she could picture him shaking his head. "Awe, hell no," he answered emphatically. "The last time I spent an evening with your drunk-ass friends, I had to keep you and Lita from punchin' each other in the face, and then I spent an hour listening to Stacy insist that her tongue had grown fuzz." Trish laughed loudly and then tried to swallow it back. "So, thanks, but not a chance in hell."

"Alright, fine. What's your locker number?" Stacy waved at her and called something about meeting at her house later, before heading toward her car.

Trish listened as John gave her a locker number and combination while she wound her way through the halls of the training facility and into the men's locker room area. "Somebody's in here," she whispered into the phone.

"Probably just Dave," John answered from his end, and Trish felt like her heart had stopped. She could hear the shower running, and to imagine him standing under the spray, in all of his naked glory, made her body tingle. "He's always there later than everybody else."

"Alright, so it's 367?" He affirmed and Trish found the door, spinning the lock. "Where is it in here?"

John cleared his throat and she heard a door slam on his end. "Sorry, what was that?" She repeated the question. "Um, try the top shelf, behind the deodorant bottle," he directed.

Trish cast a look to her left, only to find her own face, several times over, staring back at her. There were professional shots, and candids, taped all over the inside of his locker, as if they were in high school. "John, your locker's so cute," she gushed. The picture in the center was her favorite – had been since the day Lita took it. They were at a Red Sox game, John in his jersey and hat, grinning like an idiot. And Trish was on his back, legs around his waist, her chin resting on the top of his head. They looked like two high school kids without a care in the world.

"It's not cute, Baby," he corrected. "It's masculine." The voice he used made Trish laugh again. "And laughing at me makes me feel very small, and insignficant," he chided.

"You are not small," she assured him, drawing a prideful laugh from his end of the phone. She pushed the deodorant can aside and gasped. There, in the corner of the shelf, sat a long, black, velvet box with a note. _Happy Anniversary, Trish. Been the best month of my life. Here's to more – John._ "You," she gasped, opening the box to reveal a delicate platinum chain with carat diamond charm, "are the best boyfriend ever!"

A loud clatter behind her snapped her attention away from her gift, and she tried not to react as she turned to see Dave, bending to pick something up off the floor. Dammit – had he heard that? John was saying something, but she couldn't listen as she watched his broad back straining to maintain control of his emotions.

She had loved him – thoroughly loved him with the kind of forever love that she had always hoped to find. And she sensed, with a twisted sixth sense, that he had felt the same. It was in his eyes every time he watched her move across a room. It was in his expression every time she caught his eye, whether he meant to be caught staring or not. When they were together, it hung in the air between them – they didn't have to say it – it was just there.

Until Trish realized that she wanted him to say it. In the beginning, she had loved the mystery of the big man, the silent strength that emanated from him. She had been drawn to the fact that he didn't need words when a smirk, or a wink, or an action would do. And when they did talk, it was about their future hopes, career goals, and family dreams. But it was always the same. He always listened, and he let her imagine what their lives would be like together. Sure, he would agree, but he never talked about how he felt, or what he wanted. He never even tried to tell her what she meant to him or how she made him feel. He bought her things, took her places, and turned her body upside down and inside out on a nightly basis. But she wanted to hear the words.

After nearly a year, she started to feel more like a sixty-year-old married woman than the twenty-nine-year-old vixen she portrayed on television. Sure, the stability and security of Dave's love, the routine of working and then visiting his girls, or her family, was comforting. But it was also mundane. And finally, even his amazing pleasure skills weren't enough to keep her around.

She had packed everything, explained that she wasn't sure the relationship was the right thing for her anymore, and then left his house without a look back. She remembered the sound of something heavy hitting the wall as she moved toward her car, but she couldn't go back. She had determined that one word, any word, would have convinced her to unpack her bags and pledge her undying devotion to him. But no words came.

Meeting John wasn't supposed to happen. At least not two weeks after she had ended her previous relationship. But he was John – charismatic, funny, and never at a loss for words. He gave her, from the beginning, with the things she had long desired. He wasn't afraid to publicly display his affection – whether at a ball game, a club, a shopping mall, or a pre-show meeting in front of the entire company. And he wasn't afraid to leave her a rambling voice mail messages about how beautiful she was or about how much he wanted her and missed her. He wasn't afraid to spend half the night telling her exactly how glad he was to have her in his life.

Lita called John "the rebound" guy. Trish wasn't entirely sure that her red-headed friend was wrong. But the rebound guy made her life fun – he let her forget about all the adult stuff that she dealt with on a daily basis, and let her be "not quite thirty" Trish.

"You still there, baby?" John asked.

But Dave had turned, slammed his locker shut, and stalked toward the door. "I'll call you later," she said into the phone, snapping it closed as she ran after him. She didn't know what she would do when she caught him, but she had to say something.

As he reached the parking lot, he stopped abruptly and turned, catching Trish's eye. "What?" he demanded. She took two steps backward at the sheer anger in his tone. His eyes softened when he recognized her fear. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to scare you," he stammered, looking at his feet and then back at her. "Did you want something, Trish?"

She stepped forward, leaving only a few feet between them. "I hate this," she said finally, not sure what words would tumble out of her mouth, only knowing that they were tripping over each other to be heard. "I hate this awkward bull shit that happens every time we're near each other. I hate not knowing if you hate me or if you wish I was dead or if you just wish I'd go away. I hate that it's so damn hard to be around you, but even more, I hate that I can't stop being around you. I hate that I can't stop thinking about you," she stomped her foot.

He smirked. Just the faintest hint of a smile in the left corner of his mouth. "You hate it?" he asked. She nodded. "You hate it, Trish? Why don't you put yourself in my shoes for a fuckin' second and think about how it feels from this side?" His voice was hushed, as though whispering was the only control he could grasp. "You just fuckin' left, Trish. You didn't tell me shit about why or what happened, you just took the fuck off. With someone else. You're damn right it's hard. How in the hell do you expect it to be easy?"

He had just spoken, in thirty seconds, more than he had said in their entire ten-month relationship. Or so it seemed to Trish. Without thought, she lunged toward him, wrapping her arms around his massive shoulders and pressing her lips to his. She didn't know what force was taking her over, but it was stronger than she could fight. To feel his mouth in reality, rather than the shadow of her fantasy, made her groan with delight.

But after a moment of indulgence, he put her feet back on the ground and shook his head. He made no attempt to hide the pain or confusion in his eyes. "I'm not doin' this, Trish. You have the best boyfriend ever now. I can't watch you destroy his life, too."

And with that, he turned on his heel and walked toward his car. She would have to see him again – that they worked together, and she had no choice. But, for the first time, she knew that her relationship with Dave Batista was over.

* * *

_This chapter's challenge quote is credited to me ex-boyfriend, Scott, who once served as designated driver for me and my "drunk-ass friends." The next day he told me that he had spent an hour listening to Arykah insist that her tongue had grown fuzz. (I think it was more like twenty minutes, but it probably felt like an hour to him.) _


	4. Orton and Kiebler, Batista and Stratus

**Her Head v. Her Heart**

**_A/N: So far, the vote is three for Trish ending up with John at the end of this story, and two for Batista. Let me know what you think before I get to chapter 14, because it's over at fifteen. Also, thanks for all the really kind reviews. I don't own anything, but I do enjoy playing with their emotions. Enjoy!

* * *

_**

"Stace, you're killing me," Trish groaned, leaning her elbow on the table. They had been to four different bars, and she was starting to feel a little less-than-sober. Things had started out really well, and they'd had a lot of fun. Until they came to this bar - and the ceiling fell in on their heads. Well, not literally. But Trish was kind of hoping that it would – after _they_ walked in, anyway.

She saw them, immediately, over Stacy's shoulder. Orton walked in, sizing up the female population in the room first, followed by Jericho and Christian. The three of them started throwing out winks and waves as they moved toward the VIP section. Trish could only hope that Stacy wouldn't turn around before the threesome got out of sight. But, to no avail. When it came to Randy Orton, Stacy Kiebler had a sixth sense.

"Well, I'm sorry, Trish, if I'm not just jumping for joy at the prospect of watching my ex-boyfriend bump and grind with not one or two half-dressed skanks, but with three. I'm sorry if that bothers me a little more than it should," Stacy declared, a little louder than she had intended. "I'm sorry if I still love him."

Trish rolled her eyes and leaned her forehead into her hands. "Alright, fine," she sighed. Stacy had two settings when drunk: laughing or sobbing – uncontrollably. "Why don't we just get out of here, so you don't have to watch it anymore?" she suggested.

Stacy started to respond, but a shadow fell over their table. Trish thought his over-gelled hair, too-tight tee shirt, and arrogant smirk were downright ridiculous, but he was right up Stacy's ally. With a devious grin, the taller of the two women batted her eyelashes at the man and then ran a finger over the rim of her empty shot glass. "Hi."

He cleared his throat. "You wanna dance?" the guy asked her. She winked at Trish and stood, smoothing her teeny-tiny skirt over her round behind.

_Great_, Trish thought as she sat alone at her table, drinking an apple martini and wondering what she was doing. She had a super-fun boyfriend at home, and she was sitting here alone, watching Stacy wriggle and writhe all over two guys in the middle of the dance floor. The only redeeming quality of the evening, as far as she could tell, was that Stacy's little "seduction" seemed to be working wonders on Orton's jealousy. It was apparent on his face, as he tried to keep up with his three ho's. She was anxiously awaiting the angry dance-off that was bound to break out soon.

And then he walked in. Tucking his keys into the pocket of his dark dress pants, Trish watched as Dave's eyes scanned the crowd. He located Christian and Jericho by the bar and made his way over to them. And try as she might not to watch, Trish found she couldn't peel her eyes away from the man who had, just hours before, made it crystal clear that he had no interest in her anymore.

"Hey, guys," Dave said, a hand on Jericho's shoulder.

"Dave. Hey!" Christian said loudly, patting his friend's arm with great vigor. "Let me buy you a drink, my friend," he turned back to the bartender and ordered a beer for Dave. "Dude, the women are fine tonight," Christian said, when he turned back around and handed the beer off.

Dave nodded and sipped at the bottle, scanning the room. He almost laughed when his eyes fell on the latest episode of "The Randy and Stacy Show." "What's goin' on there?" he asked, following the other two men back to their table. It was near the back of the club, in the VIP section, which Dave took as a good thing. From here, he couldn't see Trish, sitting alone at that table, looking so pathetic and lonely.

"Randy was just bein' Randy, and then Stacy kinda stepped it up," Jericho explained as they reached their seats. "Of course, that leaves poor Trish over there all by herself," he winked at Dave, who just shook his head. "What's that mean?" he asked of the gesture. "It doesn't leave Trish by herself?"

"Don't," was all Dave said in response.

She felt the vibrating of her cell phone at her side, and Trish dug it out of her little purse. "You're not supposed to be calling me," she scolded with a hint of laughter.

"I am gonna kick yo ass fo real if ya don't stop that shit," he laughed.

"Excuse me?" Trish asked, running her little finger around the inside of her glass before sucking it between her lips.

He cleared his throat and laughed. "Sorry, baby. Trademarc's tryin' to pull some bull shit move," he explained. "Are you busy?"

She let her eyes roam the room again. Stacy had drawn a crowd of nearly ten guys now, and she was eating up all of their attention. Randy, while only clinging to six girls, was upping the ante on the PDA, letting them claw, rub, lick, and nip at his chest, fingers, and back. "Um, depends on what you call busy," she rolled her eyes. "So, what do you need?"

There was more beeping on his end of the phone before he answered. "Um, nothing. Why?"

Leaning back in the booth, she crossed her legs and rolled her eyes. "Because you called me, jack ass," she laughed. "Not that I'm complaining."

"Awe, does somebody miss me?" he asked.

She loved when he called her for no reason. What she didn't love was when he called her while doing something else. He wasn't the master of splitting his focus. "Probably," she nodded. "I'm sure your momma misses you."

"That's cold, baby," he informed her.

Another shadow fell over the table, and Trish looked up to find the same guy who had originally asked Stacy to dance, now hovering over her. "Can I help you?" she asked.

"Why don't you come dance with your friend out there?" he motioned over his shoulder.

Trish rolled her eyes as John asked her something. But she wasn't listening – not while she was busy leveling this jackass with a gaze. That metrosexual pretty boy might be Stacy's idea of beautiful, but Trish wasn't buying it. "I'm kinda on the phone here," she told him.

"It's a club," the guy said, as if she should know better than to use her cell phone in a night club.

"Thank you, Captain Obvious, for that," she rolled her eyes again. "Look, I'm busy right now, and even if I wasn't – I'm not dancin' with you. So go away," she stated simply.

John's voice was growing in volume, and deepening in tone. "—I'm gonna fuck him up," he threatened. "Trish!"

She jumped at the sound of her name, but kept her eyes on the guy who looked like he had no intention of leaving her alone. "Baby, I can take care of it," she assured John.

That's when she noticed Dave, holding his phone to his ear and approaching the table from behind her intruder. "Don't worry, okay?"

"Call me later," John said, his voice clipped and irritated. Even though he wanted to be there, to sink his fist into anyone's face who made her uncomfortable, or pissed her off, he knew Trish. And he knew that she could take care of herself.

Trish heard the line go dead, and she smiled as she snapped it closed and watched Dave put his hand on the guy's shoulder. "I'm not worried," he answered, as though he had been the one talking to her all along. "Sorry I'm late," he winked at her as he "gently" pushed the pretty boy out of his way to slide into the booth beside Trish.

She accepted the kiss he placed on her cheek and noticed that her suitor had backed away with wide eyes. "Thanks," she whispered when they were alone, noting that his arm was still around her shoulder, resting against the back of the booth. "I don't think he'll be back," she laughed nervously.

Dave wanted to move. He wanted to run back to his seat and try to forget the searing heat that the mere touch of her skin was igniting against his arm. But something was holding him there, keeping him from moving an inch. "You probably didn't need my help," he said, staring at the top of the table.

She shrugged. "I've missed the look on their faces when you show up to save the day," she admitted softly.

His fingers, of their own volition, trailed up and down her bare arm, affecting them both with identical chills at the contact. She knew it was wrong, but her manicured hand found his thigh under the table and began to echo the touch of his fingers. The muscles beneath his silky dress pants jumped and twitched, but the look on his face was stoic. And he said nothing.

"Can I get you guys another drink or something?" the waitress asked, interrupting their moment.

Trish was at a loss – she couldn't think of anything but the warmth that was enveloping her as she sat so close to him again. She responded only when he moved his arm and reached into his pocket for his wallet. "Um, I'll have another martini," she stammered.

The waitress nodded and took her empty glass, turning to Dave for his order. "Just an Corona?"

She turned, her little skirt swishing, and left them alone again. Trish tried her best to keep her eyes on the top of the table, for fear that a glance back at him would break her heart into a thousand pieces. She had left her relationship with Dave for a reason. She was with John now for a reason. And yet, for the life of her, she couldn't remember what any of those reasons were at the moment.

Dave tried to distract himself from her hand on his thigh as he opened his wallet and extracted a twenty dollar bill. He had meant what he said to her at the gym. Even though he knew that he loved Trish more than Cena was prepared to love her at this point in their lives, he was not willing to take anyone else's girlfriend away. He still didn't know what he had done to ruin their relationship, and he wasn't really anxious to have the failure of another on his hands, too.

"I love that picture," Trish's voice broke his reverie. Glancing down, he smiled in spite of himself. He loved it, too. They were standing outside of a children's hospital, both toting their championship belts. There were smiles on their faces and Dave's arm was protectively wrapped around Trish's waist. Stacy had said that they're coordinating, professional attire made them look like the President and First Lady of the company.

"Me, too," he answered, handing the twenty to the waitress as she sat their drinks on the table. "You were beautiful that day," he muttered under his breath, looking again at the conservative, black dress she was wearing. Sure, her ring attire was sexy. And the lingerie that she had sported when they were together had been pretty damn amazing, too. Hell, if he was honest, she was beautiful in sweat pants or jeans or anything at all.

Trish couldn't think of anything to say in response. He had never, in nearly a year together, told her that she was beautiful. He looked at her with great affection, respect, or admiration. He had nodded, and laughed, in agreement when his daughter told him his new girlfriend was smokin' hot. But he never said the words. She blushed wildly as she realized that they tickled her eardrums. It sounded different, in his deep bravado, than it did coming from John. She wasn't sure it was better, or worse – just that it was different.

"What?" he asked when she started to laugh.

Shaking her long locks, she turned her body toward him slightly and leaned on her elbow, not even realizing that her hand was still on his thigh. "Nothing," she assured him. His eyebrow shot up, skeptically. "No, I just," she stopped when his lip twitched in amusement.

He forgot, for just a moment, that he was supposed to be getting over her. He forgot that she had broken his heart. It was impossible to think about the pain when they were sharing an unspoken inside joke. Of everything he missed about Trish Stratus, what he missed the most was her ability to understand everything he was thinking without him having to say a word. He missed staring into her eyes for hours at a time, neither of them speaking, but both of them knowing exactly what the other meant.

Cena wasn't just another guy on the roster. He had been a friend, and a respected teammate, for years. To make a move on his girlfriend would be wrong. But her eyes were begging him to dip his head and taste the apple sweetness of the alcohol on her lips. Her fingers tightened on his thigh as she braced herself for contact.

Trish felt her heart accelerate as Dave captured her bottom lip between his and sucked it gently into his mouth. Her tongue jutted forward and pleaded for entrance into his mouth. Moving his hand from her shoulder to the back of her head, he tilted his body as she leaned back in the booth. She frantically pulled at his shirt, trying her best to subtly lift the hem from his waistband. She needed to feel the heat that she could sense radiating from his body through the fabric.

He trapped her hand against his body as she raked her fingernails over his chest. "Not here," he breathed, looking to where so many of their friends and coworkers were either seated, or dancing. "Let's go to my house?"

Trish nodded and grabbed her purse, following him out of the booth and out the back door. She knew that getting into his car meant blowing right past the point of no return. She had a boyfriend – one who was better for her than she ever deserved. But there was a magnetism to Dave that she just couldn't deny. She knew she was wrong, and her body didn't care.

* * *

_This chapter's challenge quote is actually just two words: "Captain Obvious." I finally used it, Liv, so leave me alone about it. Also, if you want to see the pictures that I refer to in this chapter, the ones of Dave and Trish with their belts at the hospital? I found them at Batista Online, in the "appearances" section of the gallery. _


	5. Couldn't, Shouldn't, Wouldn't, Did

**Her Head v. Her Heart**

_**A/N:** I have said it before, and I will say it again: Nobody fuckin' rocks a suit like Dave Batista. For those of you who didn't understand the term "lickable" in the first chapter of this story - I ask you to watch any footage of Batista's entrance on Smackdown tonight. When he climbed into the ring and tossed his sunglasses to the mat? That, my friends, is lickable. I was losing my mind. My boyfriend is threatening to revoke my TiVo privileges if I don't stop running it back and watching it repeatedly. That being said, I knew I had to write another chapter in this story while I'm still on the euphoric high of how damn good he looked! Maybe the best he's looked since rocking the gray suit and the pink shirt on RAW! I don't own any of the characters in this story, but after Smackdown tonight, I know what I'd do with Batista if I did!

* * *

_

For the first time in six weeks, Dave faced the morning sunlight with a smile on his face. With his eyes still tightly closed, he listened to the sound of Trish's laughter, and felt butterflies fighting for position in his gut. He rolled to his side, face still half-concealed by the pillow, and opened one eye.

Trish winked and waved as she pressed her phone to her ear and moved around the room, tying her wet hair up in a ponytail. "Because if you don't get up now, you're gonna miss the fuckin' bus. Again," she scolded John with a smile.

"It's early," John groaned into the phone.

"Well, maybe," Trish sank to the bed beside Dave and ran her fingernails down his bare back, "if you didn't stay up all night playing video games like a dumbass frat boy, you wouldn't be so drained," she scolded.

Dave rolled over and grabbed her hand, raising it to his lips. He grinned as she gasped when he sucked her middle finger into his mouth. He listened to her try to explain away the sharp intake of breath as his tongue swirled over her knuckle. "I'll pick you up in forty-five minutes." She reminded him of his ex-wife, every time she had tried to get the girls up for school.

When she shut her cell phone, she leveled Dave with an amused, but sincere, look. "What?" he asked.

She leaned forward and dropped a kiss on his chest before groaning and standing. "I gotta get outta here," she whispered, tilting her face for a quick peck.

He turned it into a throat-licking embrace, pulling her fully-clothed body flush against his fully-naked one. "Why?" he asked when he finally withdrew his tongue from her mouth.

Trish ground against his hardening erection, and then stood with ease. "I don't have time to go again. I have to get home, get my shit, get John, and get to the bus," she rolled her eyes, standing. "But maybe, after we check into the hotel in Manhattan? Maybe we can find some time?"

Suddenly, what they were doing seemed to click in his head. He struggled to sit, securing a mound of covers over his lap and running a hand over his head. "Trish, this can't happen again," he informed her. She looked confused. "Not because I don't want to, believe me. But John's my friend," he said.

"I don't want to hurt him, either," Trish stated, reaching for her purse on the floor. "But, Dave, it's just not the same," she explained.

He cringed and felt like his heart broke a little bit. "Trish, if it was that great, you wouldn't have left," he pointed out.

She watched his eyes darken with sadness. She couldn't stay. John would be waiting for her, and if this was the day Dave decided to talk? She didn't know what she would do. "You know what? You're right. Things with John are really good and I don't wanna fuck with that, so I'm gonna go," she stuttered, heading toward the door. Turning, she gave him her most wide-eyed look. "Please don't tell him," she asked.

He nodded and watched her leave. He had never intended to tell his friend anything, but now that she had asked it of him? His lips were sealed. Because he knew, no matter how much distance he managed to put between them, there would never come a day when he wouldn't move and Heaven and Earth for that girl.

XXX

"Did you guys have fun last night?"

Trish's head whipped to the side. John was looking out the window at the passing scenery, tapping his hand to the rhythm of the radio. "Huh?" she asked.

He met her eye and laughed a little at the "deer-in-the-headlights" look he was giving her. "You and Stacy? Did you have fun last night? Ya know? With your Girls' Night?"

She swallowed her guilt and nodded, laughing slightly. "Yeah, it was, um, fun. Stacy spent the night trying to make Randy jealous," she rolled her eyes.

"It worked," John nodded, turning his body toward her. He thought he saw her shoulders stiffen, but he couldn't be sure. "He showed up around two, bitchin' and moanin' about how she started gettin' all this attention last night, and about how she salted his game," he laughed.

"Oh," Trish forced a laugh. Randy had gone to John's? What if he had said something about she and Dave disappearing together? What if he already knew what they'd done and he was just testing her. She felt like her skin was on fire all the sudden, and she nearly ran off the road when he put a hand on her thigh.

"You okay, baby?" John asked, concern in his features as she slowed the car to a stop on the shoulder of the road. "You want me to drive?"

She shook her head and put a hand on the back of his neck. "I want you to kiss me," she breathed, pressing her lips to his. She had to get the taste of Dave out of her mouth. What they had done had been an indiscretion. It had been a mistake. This man, willingly kissing her on the side of some deserted highway in Connecticut at 6:45 in the morning, was the one that she wanted to be with.

"Please don't think I'm complaining about this," John sighed, searching her eyes for some explanation to what she had just done. Shaking his head, he chose to let it go, instead. "Nevermind. I'm not complaining," he winked, leaning in for another round.

Trish leaned her forehead against his. "I missed you last night," was all she said before she kissed him again. Dave had been great last night. He had been everything she remembered him to be. He had been generous and gentle. He had been passionate and powerful. And he had been lovely and lickable. But he hadn't cracked any post-coital jokes. And he hadn't blasted the hip-hop music to mask the sounds of their heavy breathing. He would always be the best she ever hand, but he wasn't John.

And if she kept telling herself that, maybe she would forget the four orgasms she had experienced over the course of the six hours she had spent in Dave's bed.

* * *

_There it is, Liv - "Throat Licking" in a story, just for you. I think this means you can stop saying it now - it's gross!_


	6. Guilty Confession, Secret Solutions

Trish paced beside the bed of the hotel room she was sharing with John for the evening. The bus ride had been good, and by the time she got to New York, she knew that she had made the right choice. John was the guy she wanted to be with. He was the guy that made her laugh, and fascinated her with every story and theory that he shared. He was beautiful and he had more charisma than anyone she had ever met. He was her boyfriend, and she was lucky to be able to say that.

But now he was in the gym with Randy, Chris, and Dave, so she was left to ponder her sins once again. A knock sounded at the door and she jumped. She let Lita in and then stepped away from the door, continuing her pacing, as her friend sat on the bed and watched her with a raised eyebrow. "What the hell, Trish?" Lita finally asked.

"I think I'm falling in love with John," she said, biting her lip.

With a roll of her eyes, Lita flopped back on the bed. "You called me away from the last of my alone time with my beautiful man to tell me that?" She sat back up and threw her arms up in the air. "I could have told you that on the phone." Trish sank to the bed, her eyes focused on the floor. "What's really going on?" she asked.

She wanted to tell her best friend what the real problem was, but saying the words felt wrong. She couldn't get them to move past her lips. "I'm. . . I just think. . . Dammit, Lita, I can't say it," she sank a clenched fist into the mattress at her side.

It wasn't the first time Lita had watched Trish hem-haw around whatever she was thinking or feeling. But what had once been an eccentric quirk was quickly becoming a pain in the red-head's ass. "Well, why don't you try to get it together by show time tonight, and we can talk about it then?" She headed for the door.

"I slept with Dave last night," she spat before Lita could get outside the room.

Lita's face reflected a shock that Trish hadn't expected. For as long as she had been in the WWE, she and Lita had been friends for one reason. They got along for a lot of reasons, but they were friends because neither ever stood in judgment of one another. And what could Lita say in this situation anyway? Hadn't she started her relationship with Edge before she ever ended the one with Matt?

Letting go of the door handle, the South Carolinian diva moved back toward the bed and sat, shaking her head. "How?"

"I don't even know. Stace and I went out last night and she was dancin' with all these guys, and then Dave showed up, and the next thing I know, I was at his house and we were all kinds of naked vertical in the hallway," she shook her head and stopped short. "Sorry," she flinched.

There was an awkward moment of silence as Lita studied her friend's conflicted face and tried to come up with some sort of feasible advice. "What do you want me to say, Trish?" she asked. "I'm not exactly the queen of fidelity, ya know?"

Trish nodded and flopped back on the bed with a heavy sigh. "I don't know what I want. I just, maybe that's the problem." She blinked at the ceiling, trying to get the intensity of Dave's lust-filled eyes out of her head. "I don't know what to do about Dave?"

"Why do you have to do anything about it?" Lita shrugged and noted that Trish didn't seem to understand her question. "Why'd you leave him, Trish? For real?"

Her gaze was unwavering and her tone said that she didn't have the patience for any bull shit answers. Some people found Lita's assertive, somewhat abrasive, nature unattractive and disconcerting. Trish knew that it was something she needed, someone to anchor her when she tried to justify and rationalize everything in her life.

"I loved him," Trish said sadly. "It was real, Li." Her voice started to fade as she stared blankly at the ceiling. "But it was so serious. I mean, we talked about buying a house together, and about kids. We talked about marriage, Lita," she huffed and shook her head. "I'm twenty-nine. I'm not old enough to be worried about being tied down yet," she stated.

Lita laughed. "You're totally having a mid-life crisis, Trish," she accused. Her friend flipped her off. "Seriously. You freaked at the thought of being a responsible, mature adult. And you totally rebounded with one of the most immature and irresponsible guy in our business."

Trish felt her stomach sink. Was that it? "He's not immature or irresponsible, Lita. I mean, he can act like it sometimes, but that's cause he's a guy. A lot of it's his character," she reminded.

But Lita shook her head. "Alright, fine. Whatever, Trish, it's not a bad thing. I mean, if you weren't ready to get serious with Dave, you didn't have to get serious. I've never blamed you for ending it, have I?" Trish agreed. "I'm just sayin' that you walked away because it's what you thought you needed to do. It's not your job to make sure that he gets over it."

"I'm not –" Trish started.

Lita stood from the bed and stretched her arms over her head. "You are, Trish. You still love him, at least a part of you does. And you don't want to see him missing you, so you're trying to help. But you can't." She moved toward the door again, but threw a final warning over her shoulder. "The only thing you're gonna do is make sure that everyone – Dave, John, and you – gets hurt."

With that, she stepped into the hall and secured the door behind her. She had spent an hour listening to Stacy cry about how she knew it was wrong, but she couldn't get over Randy, and then another twenty minutes consulting Trish about Dave and John. Lita laughed to herself as she walked toward the elevator. Did either of them realize that she didn't have a clue as to how to make a relationship work?

She waited as the elevator dinged and then smiled as the answer walked out, smiling at her and offering a little wave and greeting. As she pressed her floor number and waited for the doors to close, she watched Stacy and Dave making their way down the hall, laughing about something he was telling her.

As she descended toward the lobby to meet Edge, Lita formulated a plan. It felt a little bit incestuous, weaving the ex's together, but desperate times called for desperate measures. And the salvation of her own sanity was a desperate time, as far as she was concerned.


	7. Bro's Over Ho's? No!

**Her Head v. Her Heart**

_A/N: So, I didn't think that I would be getting this chapter up before Monday afternoon, but Arykah's here and she helped me out with it. So here ya go --ENJOY! (Don't own anything - but you knew that.)

* * *

_

Trish could remember a time when they didn't hang out together – not all of them in a big group. She could remember a time when she, Lita, and Stacy would just go back to the hotel after a house show or a taping, and order movies, eat junk food, and talk about men. Even when Lita started dating Matt, they had just invited him into their little slumber parties and stayed in.

But then Trish had started dating Dave, and Stacy hooked up with Randy, and it was easier for everyone to hang out in a bar once every week or so, than it was to fit in a hotel room. The more of a habit it became, the bigger the group seemed to grow. For months, it had been Lita, Stacy, and Trish against five or six guys. But now that the list of regulars was growing, the odds were starting to even out. Victoria had started to join them, and if they were at a Super Show or a combined PPV, Torrie and Jackie would come along, too.

Normally, she liked the crowds, but tonight wasn't normal. Tonight, their group consisted of herself and John, Lita and Edge, Stacy, Victoria, Jericho, Hunter, and Dave. That was no problem – that was her favorite mix of people in the world. But, for reasons known only to God and himself, Jericho had also invited Christy and Maria. Their high-pitched laughter and incessant giggling was enough to make Trish nearly come unhinged. She had already decided that if Maria laughed at one more thing John said, especially if it wasn't funny, she was going to lunge across the table and rip her throat out.

"So, Christy," Chris leaned toward the girl on his left after the waitress brought their second round of drinks. "Do you have a boyfriend now or what, Sweetheart?"

Lita rolled her eyes in Trish's direction and made a "gagging" face. John was the only other person that caught it, but he did his best to swallow back the laughter that was trying to escape his throat.

If Christy noticed, she didn't react. Fixated on Chris, she cleared her throat and sadly shook her head. "I was kinda into this guy from back home, but he was friends with my "ex" and he told me it just wasn't gonna work out." Rolling her eyes, she raised the bottle to her lips. "Something about 'bro's before ho's' or something?" she added with a questioning look in her eyes.

"That is bull shit," Lita piped up. It was such a defiant statement that it nearly made Trish jump. Edge even looked a little surprised by her outburst. "Well, it is. I mean, who actually believes that bull shit about not getting with someone just because your friend was with her before?"

The guys looked hesitant to answer, especially when Lita looked to her right and saw Edge's hand up. Her eyes doubled in size as she guffawed, almost spitting her beer onto the table top. "What?" he asked.

She rolled her eyes and Trish took another drink, settling against John's shoulder as he wrapped his arm around her waist and leaned back in his chair. "You are one of two men at this table who cannot, with any amount of credibility, be in favor of that whole theory."

"Why?" Edge asked, popping a French fry into his mouth.

"Because you started bangin' your friend's ex before they broke up?" Victoria reminded him.

Another roll of his eyes sent Edge slumping into his chair. "Alright, fine. I ended a friendship over a girl. I suck," he threw his hands in the air and then reached for his beer. "I think, though, that every guy believes in The Code to some degree. It just depends on how, and to what extent, you follow it," he added. "If you had been with Christian, I would have never looked at you twice," he pointed out.

Trish quietly drank her beer and abstained from the conversation. "What about you, John? How do you justify yourself?" Lita asked, and Trish leaned over to punch her friend's thigh under the table. "Ouch. What?" Lita asked.

John cleared his throat and moved his arm from Trish's waist to the back of her chair, shifting his weight and risking a quick glance at Dave. The big man seemed amused at his friend's discomfort. "I can't justify it," he stated honestly. "It wasn't supposed to happen."

Though he very rarely spoke at these little get-togethers, Trish heard Dave clear his throat, a tell-tale sign that he was getting ready to lay something on them. "He asked me first," he said.

Her eyes, as well as Lita and Stacy's, doubled in size. "He what?" Trish asked, her mouth gaping as she turned to look at her boyfriend. "You asked for permission to date me?"

John nodded, and she noticed an adorable blush growing in his cheeks. "I'd been noticin' you for awhile, but Dave's been my boy for years. And I didn't so much ask as. . ." he trailed, as if trying to figure out how to explain it. When he and Dave had talked about John dating Trish, there had been a sort of unspoken agreement that she would never have to know about it.

"He was obviously into you, and we were obviously done, so I told him to go for it," Dave admitted, meeting Trish's eye and doing everything he could to mask the emotion behind his eyes.

It had been the hardest thing he had ever done, but after only one night of watching them together, he knew it was the best thing for Trish. Even through the dim haze of his broken heart, he could tell that she lit up every time John showed her the slightest bit of attention. She laughed with him, and she looked happy. It was the look she used to give him, in the beginning. It was the look that made his stomach turn all rainbows and butterflies. There was nothing in the world more beautiful, in his opinion, than a smiling Trish Stratus.

Trish's heart ached slightly at the sacrificial gift of love he had given her without letting her know. She had turned his entire world inside out without any notice, and he had turned around and given her what he thought would make her happy. Tears pricked the backs of her eyes and she reached out for John's hand, squeezing it tightly.

"See," Randy interjected with the shake of his head. "I don't get that," he told Dave. "I think you just don't fuck with a friend's girl. Even if they are "ex," he insisted.

Lita, ever the opportunist, seized this comment as the perfect moment to swing her plan into action. "That's where guys and girls are different, I think. I mean, let me ask you something, Trish. Hypothetically, if Stacy wanted to hook up with Dave, would you have a problem with it?" the red-head asked, pointing to her two friends across the table, sitting side-by-side and looking incredibly uncomfortable.

Trish wanted to scream "yes" and demand that he never sleep with anyone else ever again. But that was ridiculous, and her boyfriend was anxiously anticipating her answer. Shaking her head, she licked her lips and tried to think of the best answer to give. "I don't know that I would wanna hear all the details that we usually give each other about our men, but I mean, what can I say? I can't expect him to never date again, ya know?" She knew his eyes were on her, but she couldn't make herself look at him. If she was going to say what she needed to say, she couldn't look in his eyes to do it. "Especially not since I'm the one that ended it."

Randy was insistent with the shake of his head. "Doesn't matter who ended it. It's a matter of respect, ya know?"

"So you'd have a problem with Stacy and Dave?" Lita asked him, her eyebrow raised.

Nodding as though it were obvious, Randy took another drink. "I'd have a problem with Stacy and anyone at this table. There are millions of men and women in the world. There's no reason that my friends have to pick my girl."

Stacy slammed her cocktail glass onto the table and turned firey eyes toward him. "What the fuck kinda logic is that, ass hole?" He looked taken aback. "You wanna look me in the eye and shoot off that line about respect again? I am NOT your girl. I WAS your girl, until you decided that you needed to get some skank ass fromas many random groupies as you could get up in. I was your girl until you decided that wasn't enough for you. And if you ever, EVER, fuck with my sex life in some backward attempt to boost your own fuckin' ego?" She stood up, glaring through him with firey eyes. "You better pray I never hear about it."

How he had become the center of this argument, he didn't know. But Dave stood quietly, slid his chair to the table, and extended his hand to Stacy. No doubt, there would be hell to pay later, but he didn't care. He was tired of Randy showing up at random hours, complaining about women using him for his fame or his money. He was tired of hearing the young man bitch and moan about being unhappy with his life. Dave had a feeling it had something to do with losing Stacy, and if this is how he had to show Randy that she wasn't going to sit around and wait for him to be ready, this is what he would do. And if it helped him show Trish that he was capable of moving on, that their little tryst the week before had meant as little to him as it had to her, that was a bonus.

Lita watched Dave lead Stacy out the front door of the bar and smiled to herself. That had been a lot easier than she had anticipated. But her victory was short-lived as she turned and saw the look on John's face. It was the heartbreaking expression of a man who knew that he would never have as much of his love's heart as he wanted.

* * *

_Just wanted to give you a head's up - I know I haven't given you much John/Trish alone time - but it's coming. The next chapter will be the "Stratus-Cena Show." _


	8. Supposed To, Want To

**His Head v. His Heart**

_A/N: I'm about half-way through this story now, so I thought I would update you all on the current standings. As you know, I haven't decided who Trish is actually going to end up with when this thing is all over. I'm writing the final chapter based solely on the popular vote. According to the reviews I've received to this point, the score is 9 to 4 in favor of Batista. Feel free to vote every time you submit a review - some people have been persistent and adamant about their opinions, and I assure you that I'm listening. I'm formulating two different endings, and I'll just post the one that is most requested after chapter fourteen goes up.

* * *

_

The music was pumping through the speakers of the sleek, silver Hummer as John steered his car along the deserted Illinois highway, headed toward the arena at Northwestern University outside of Chicago. He was tapping the beat on the wheel as Trish's sweet voice carried the lilting hook, her head bobbing with the bass line as she waved her hand out the window.

"Do you have any idea how adorable you are right now?" he asked, laughing to himself as she turned a giddy grin his way.

"Do you have any idea how bad I have to pee right now?" she asked in return.

John swept his eyes over the road and checked the signs. "Gas station in two miles," he pointed off to the side. "Can you hold it?"

Rolling her eyes, Trish reached across the center console to rest her hand on his thigh, nodding. "I'm a big girl now," she told him.

The two miles seemed more like twenty by the time he directed the vehicle into the parking lot of a rundown roadside gas station/gift shop combo. She tapped her feet impatiently as he headed for a parking space, her hand poised on the handle. Without waiting for a complete stop, she ran to the front door and disappeared inside while he pocketed his keys and shook his head.

The look on her face in Missouri, when he suggested stopping at Sonic, had been priceless. Apparently, her travels across America had introduced her to the drive-in chain and the Canadian had developed an extreme fondness for their patented Cherry Limeade. Now, though, it seemed that the drink had spent enough time in the land of Trish and was ready to make a speedy exit.

He moved toward the door she had gone through and noted the hand-written sign taped to the glass. 'We Sell Live Bait.' Classy. It was the kind of place he always loved when traveling with Randy and Chris. They had an entire box full of ridiculous souveniers they had picked up in places like this over time, and he hoped to one day show his children howinteresting his life had been by showing them that very box.

He was eyeing a shelf of generic bumper stickers when he felt fingernails on his back. "I think I may have contracted an STD in that bathroom," Trish whispered into his back.

Turning, he raised an eyebrow and pushed her back slightly. He started to retort and then smiled, grabbing a trucker hat from the rack behind him and setting it on the top of her head. "You know what the worst part about that is?" he asked. She turned and puckered her lips, grabbing the bill of her hat as she struck a pose for him. "I don't even fuckin' care," he laughed, pulling her into his arms and pressing her face into the chest of the New England Patriots jersey he was wearing.

"Oh, you don't have to worry," Trish assured him, holding up a small blue package. "There were tropical fruit flavored, glow in the dark, ribbed for HER pleasure condoms in the machine," she winked as he snatched the object out of her hand and slid it into his back pocket.

Trish followed him to a large display of tee shirts and laughed as he surveyed each one. "If I buy this, will you wear it for me tonight?" he asked, holding up a large white shirt for her inspection, the words 'Blonde: The Other White Meat' emblazoned across the front.

She searched the rack for a minute and then held up a shirt of her own. "If you'll wear this one for me."

The one she held up said 'What do you think? It's going to suck itself?', and John's lips curled up in amusement as he nodded his head. "Deal," he agreed, grabbing the shirt out of Trish's hand and draping both of them over his arm.

"John, I was kidding," Trish rolled her eyes and tried to take the corny, tackier than tacky pieces of clothing back. He held both of them over his head and took her wrist in his free hand, his eyes wide in challenge. "Don't waste your money on that bull shit," she laughed.

He licked his lips and shook his head. "It's not a waste, Baby." He let go of her wrist and then wrapped his fingers around hers, leading her on to another display. "Check it out," he pulled a cassette tape out of the rack and held it out for her to read.

"Oh, my God," Trish laughed loudly, resting her chin against his shoulder as she tightened her grip on his hand and took the 2 Live Crew album from him. "We gotta get this, John," she insisted, her face lighting up.

Again, he nodded and tried to take it from her, but Trish held it out of his reach. "No. You get the tee shirts, I'll get the music," she told him. Scanning the rack, she grabbed another and held it up for his perusal.

He made a horrible face and stuck his tongue out. "No fuckin' way," he said with a definitive shake of his head. Trish waved the MC Hammer cassette before John's nose and then jerked it out of his grip before her boyfriend could steal it away.

"Come on," she laughed at the pained expression on his face. "Please?" she asked, pouting her lip and giving him her best bedroom eyes. "I'll make it up to you," she whispered.

He rolled his eyes. "Dammit. That's not fair," he pouted back. "It's like a fuckin' trump card, those eyes," he whined, wrapping his arms around her waist and bending his knees to meet her lips.

The dirty, smelly gas station seemed to fade into the background as she wrapped her arms around his waist. He had a way of making it feel like someone had lit a bonfire under her blood, sending it boiling beyond control. She would readily admit, to herself anyway, that Dave was better at the whole sex scenario. He could draw out foreplay until she was ready to climax without any definitive contact, and send her into seizure like convulsions with his the simple twitch of his hips. But he couldn't kiss like this. He couldn't make her forget that they were in public and people were watching.

Unfortunately, John didn't forget that she was still holding that Hammer album. He ran his fingers down her arms and followed them to her hands, but she twisted out of his grasp, giving him a knowing wink, and then danced off toward a junk food aisle.

Wavering between a package of Ding-Dongs and a bag of Doritos, she counted to six in her head and then smiled as she felt John's hands on her hips, pulling her against his hard body. "We gotta get back on the road," he whispered in her ear, placing a tiny kiss on her neck.

They signed autographs for the check-out girl and her family, paid for their purchases, and then made their way to the car. "Is it wrong that I kinda just wanna skip the taping tonight and just drive until we can't drive anymore?" Trish asked.

John fastened his seatbelt and wiggled his eyebrows at her. "Maybe, if we get to Evanston early enough, we can find some down time?" he asked.

She nodded and let her gaze drift out the window. It wasn't that she wanted sex, necessarily, but just more of this time with John. If she, Lita, and Stacy had stopped there, it would have been a thirty second stop. They would have been there long enough for Stacy to walk inside, smell something akin to barnyard animals, and then refuse to use a bathroom with a broken toilet seat, a jacked up faucet handle, and a nearly-empty soap dispenser.

But John was different. He actually made her want to stay in that gas station, to hang out for awhile. As long as he was there, it was better than Six Flags. She watched his profile and reached for his thigh as he navigated around the three cars in their path. "I think I'm falling in love with you," she said without thinking.

As soon as the words were out of her mouth, she wished she could take them back. or at least say them differently. But the smile on his lips said that it was too late. "You think?" he asked, a hint of something indecipherable in his voice. "Don't say it if you don't know for sure, okay?"

He caught her confusion out the corner of his eye, but tried to keep his gaze fixed on the road before him. He might be goofy a few times, funny sometimes, and carefree most times, but he wasn't stupid. And he wasn't blind. He didn't know why she thought she could slide it past him, that he wouldn't recognize that a shift had occurred between them, but it was obvious and he was tired of avoiding it.

Trish bit her lip and looked out the window, her hands folded in her lap. She meant the words. She was falling in love with him. But she also knew that her voice lacked the conviction of a true confession. Probably because the only thing she wanted to confess was what she had done with Dave. She wanted John to know, and to forgive her for making a horrible mistake. She wanted to tell him that it had meant nothing, that it had only reminded her what a great thing she had in him. But every time she opened her mouth, the words refused to come out.

"Can I ask you a question?" he asked finally, turning the radio down before taking her hand in his considerably larger one.

"Of course. Anything," she turned her attention to him, tucking her leg under her body as she rotated in her seat and held his hand in hers against her thigh.

He licked his lips nervously and tried to keep his attention off the heat of her leg. "I know we agreed never to talk about our exes," he started. She didn't interrupt him. "And I know that you and me hooked up real soon after you and Dave split." He swallowed the nerves that came with the next question. "I don't have to think about it, Trish. I know I love you. I have since the beginning, since before the beginning."

She waited for him to ask the question, but it didn't come. "What do you want me to say?" she asked. "I mean, it's only been, like, six weeks. Seven," she corrected herself.

"Why you with me?" he asked abruptly. So much so that she shot him a confused, and somewhat wounded look. "Am I just your clown? Your funny little court jester? Keep you from cryin' at night when you think about him?"

Her heart sank to her shoes as she tried her best to come up with an answer. She didn't want him to feel like her rebound. She really did care about him – so much so that it scared her a little bit. It was all happening so fast and she wasn't sure she knew where the brakes were, much less if she wanted to slow the car down. But she didn't want to start thinking about the future again yet.

"Ya know what? Nevermind," John shook his head and tried to take his hand back. "Trish, we'll just talk about it later," he stated, but she refused to let go of him.

Collecting her thoughts, she held his hand with her left and ran her right index finger over his wrist. "When I was with Dave, I could be the woman I was supposed to be. From day one, I felt like I was right where I was supposed to be. I was the champion I had always dreamed of being, and I was the stable and secure. I was the Trish that I always envisioned myself being.

"But with you," she stopped and raised his hand to her lips in both of hers and kissed his knuckles, "I feel like I can be the girl I always wished I had the courage to be. You don't give a fuck about what other people think, and you love your life. People are genuinely impressed when you walk into a room. They really want you around." She held his hand to her chest, letting him feel the pounding of her heart. "I really want you around."

Long ago, a mentor had given John the best piece of advice he could have ever received. 'You can't choose circumstances. You can choose what you do with them.' He couldn't choose that Trish had loved Dave, or that fate had put them together so soon after that relationship ended. But he could choose to accept what she said as truth, and let whatever they had continue to grow. He could choose to love her freely, without regard for her past, and move into the future. Maybe someday he would convince her that he could be the guy she was supposed to be with.


	9. Three girls, One lie

**Her Head v. Her Heart**

_A/N: Just a quick note about this chapter - I really wanted to bring Dave's daughters into this story, but I don't know their names. So I'm only referring to them with pronouns. I hope that doesn't throw anyone off, but I'm not into making up names for people that really exist. Even if I don't own them. (That was my sneaky disclaimer, for anyone who might have missed it.) Also, I've gotten a couple more votes for Batista, and a couple more for Cena since the last chapter. Keep lettin' me know - I really am torn on how this thing is going to end. You have five more chapters to let me know what you think!

* * *

_

"So," Lita asked as she entered the Divas locker room before the taping. Stacy was applying eyeliner and Trish was stretching her arms over her head. "What's new with you guys?" she asked innocently, dropping her bag on the floor beside her locker. Neither of her friends answered her. "Stace?"

Turning in her seat, the statuesque blonde rolled her eyes and put her mascara tube down. "Nothing happened with Dave, Lita," she stated evenly. She let her eyes flit to Trish, but tried not to focus on the death glares her friend would be shooting. Regardless of what she had professed at the bar, Stacy knew that the Canadian would not be cool with her hooking up with the Animal himself. "He drove me back to the hotel, we talked for a few hours, and then he went back to his room," she added.

"Have you seen Randy since?" Trish asked, sounding completely disinterested.

With a huff, the Babe of the Year stood and moved to her own duffle bag, rifling for something. "He left me a couple of messages, but I'm not interested," she shook her head to prove her point, but then noticed the raised eyebrows of both her friends. "Alright, fine. I'm trying to play hard to get. Dave said that Randy is only interested in what he can't have, so I have to pretend like I'm not interested in order to get him to be interested," she explained.

Lita shook her head and blinked her eyes twice. "What the hell?" she asked, her mouth falling open. "Are you drunk?" she asked, trying to wrap her head around the run-on sentence Stacy had just spewed.

With a shake of her blonde hair, Stacy shrugged and sank back to her seat, looking at her friends. "I don't know what to do, you guys. I mean, part of me just wants to let it all go and realize that it's never going to be what I want it to be." A look of indignation clouded her face. "But where am I ever going to meet anyone else? No one in the locker room will date me now – I mean, Dave said they all take that 'bros before ho's' bull really seriously," she pouted.

"That shit really burns me up," Lita huffed. "It's like sayin' that we have no right to be with whoever we want to be with. That's like them saying that they get to control who we date for the rest of our lives. But God forbid, if you told Orton to stay away from one of us," she sank her fist into a locker.

Trish, who had been off in her own world, jumped at the sound of her friend's punch. "Settle the fuck down," she snapped without thinking.

"What's up your ass?" Stacy asked, now ready to head out to the ring.

She zipped her gym bag and kicked it against the wall. "I'm tired," she lied. "And I'd really rather not be here tonight," she added, truthfully this time.

"Seriously?" Lita asked. She had known Trish for a long time now, and she had never known her friend to not want to work a crowd. She had never known her heart not to be in the ring, even when her personal life was in upheaval.

With a shrug, Trish moved toward the door. "Just in a funk," she answered, moving past both of them and into the hall. It wasn't that anything was wrong – she was just having a hard time feeling like anything was right. It was just that overwhelming feeling that something bad was about to happen, or something not good, at the very least.

"TRISH!" The high-pitched voice hit her ears and she knew that immediately that this was the reason for her feeling. "HEY, STRATUS!"

Turning on her heel, Trish plastered on a smile as Dave's youngest daughter came barreling toward her, launching her petite, twelve-year-old body into her father's ex-girlfriend's arms. "Hey, Sweetie," she smiled in spite of herself as she looked over the young girl's head for any sign of salvation.

"We were here, like, forever ago!" the little girl's eyes were wide with exasperation. "Dad said not to bother you," she put her hands on her hips and shook her head as though her dad was the lamest person in the world.

Trish looked her over, grinning at the Stratusfaction shirt she was sporting. "I didn't know you guys were comin' this weekend," she said, trying to regain her footing as the young girl's father and older sister rounded the corner.

"Sorry," Dave laughed, reaching his large hand out to reign his youngest in. "I told you to leave Trish alone until later," he reminded.

Her huge brown eyes took on a defiant look that made Trish smile and bite her lip. "Dad, she was coming out of the locker room. I wasn't interrupting. Was I interrupting you, Trish?"

All she could do was shake her head and bite her fingernail, but the laugh bubbled out before she had a chance to stop it. "It's fine, Dave," she assured him. He looked exhausted, and she had no doubt that he was. Every time he was on "dad" duty, it wore him out.

Dave watched his ex-girlfriend as his daughters swarmed her and began asking her a hundred questions about how she had been and what she had been up to. He knew that they would have to learn the truth on this visit – the truth he had hidden for the last two months. They still thought she was his girlfriend, that she was going to marry their dad someday and be their new step-mom. Sometimes, he still thought it. Telling them the truth meant accepting it for himself, and he just wasn't ready to do that yet.

"So, when we go back to the hotel, can we do facials like last time?" his older daughter asked.

Trish flinched slightly, but never looked to Dave for an explanation. He hadn't told them yet. And until he did, she would have to play along with the charade – it was not her job to tell his kids that their relationship was over. She tucked a strand of her hair behind her ears and put an arm around each girls' shoulders, leading them away from their father, down the hall. "We'll do facials, eat junk food, and watch movies that your dad hates. How's that sound?"

Dave felt like he was going to vomit as he watched them walk away, planning their evening happily. But before he could turn to find the nearest bathroom, he felt a heavy hand on his shoulder. "Dude, I know you want her back, but isn't pulling the "kid card" kinda low?"

Turning, Dave's shoulders slumped when he saw Randy standing behind him. "I wasn't trying to get her back. Angie had some stuff to do, so she called me last week and asked if the girls could fly out for their summer visit a little early. I just haven't had time to tell them that I'm not dating Trish anymore," he answered guiltily.

"I bet he'll be happy to tell them," Randy nodded to where Trish was introducing the girls to John. He seemed confused, but smiled and flirted and charmed them with the same charisma he gave everyone else. "So, enough about you," the younger man clapped his hands together and crossed his arms.

"Stacy's sick of your bull shit. And I'm startin' to agree," Dave growled angrily.

Telling John it was okay for him to date Trish was one thing. But now the guy had his kids thinkin' he was the shit, too. He wasn't sure that any friendship was strong enough to support the kick his ego was taking at the moment.

He turned on his heel and stalked back toward the locker room, leaving Randy to pout alone. He hadn't planned it, but he sure as hell wasn't going to fight it if his girls could succeed in doing the one thing he couldn't – bringing his love back to him.


	10. Placing Blame and Absolving Guilt

**Her Head v. Her Heart**

_A/N: This chapter was never supposed to be in the story, but I felt like it needed to be. Anyway, hope you guys like it. I don't have enough cash to rent these guys for a night, let alone own them, so there's my disclaimer. Also, just thought I'd let you know that Dave is still winning the popular vote in the battle for Trish, but you've still got four chapters to fix it, Chain Gang.

* * *

_

The television lulled Trish to a near-sleeping state as she lounged on the huge bed in Dave's hotel room, one of his girls on each side of her. The youngest was sleeping soundly, her head resting on Trish's thigh, while the older girl leaned against Trish's shoulder, watching some ridiculous count-down show on VH1.

John had been a little jittery at the idea of his girlfriend spending the night in her ex's room, so she had suggested that he take Dave out for drinks after the show. She reasoned that the two old friends hadn't had a lot of time together as of late, thanks to her, and it would be good for them. And, she had promised, she would come right back to his room as soon as their father was back and the girls were soundly sleeping for the night.

As the smaller girl in her lap rolled over and buried her face in Trish's stomach, clutching her toned arm with little hands, she felt an unsettling emotion flood her chest. This is why she had left him. Sure, she told herself it was because he never said he loved her, but she knew it wasn't true, not completely. Maybe he never said it, but he showed it in ways no one had ever shown her love. He gave her everything she ever asked for, and a lot of what she didn't, just because he could. He was there, all the time, no matter what kind of mood she was in. He had shown her unconditional love – he didn't have to say it.

All he wanted in return was this. He wanted a mom for his girls and a wife for himself, and Trish just wasn't ready for it. Even now, she knew she wasn't ready. She could play the cool babysitter for a night, but when it came down to the every day stuff, she didn't want it. She didn't want to cancel a weekend trip to Mexico with her friends because one of his girls had a dance recital or a soccer game. She didn't want to give up R rated movies so they could take the girls to a PG one. And she didn't want to sacrifice great sex because the girls were asleep down the hall.

She knew that it was selfish – that most women her age would give up all of those things in a heartbeat just to know the love of a child, and to savor the mother/daughter relationship that was far more important than any of her petty interests. But Trish knew that she was too self-centered to be any good for them in the long run, and she thought she had done the right thing by getting out before they all got too attached and things became too permanent. Staring at the beautiful, sleeping angel on her leg, she assured herself that she made the right decision. This was not the life she wanted. Not yet.

"Trish?"

The hush of the older girl's voice interrupted her thoughts as Trish leaned her cheek to the top of her dark head to hear better. "What's up, Kiddo?"

"I know about you and my dad," the answer came.

All of the emotions Trish had been feeling previously seemed to ball up and drop to her toes. She wasn't supposed to know. Neither of them was supposed to know. "Yeah?" she asked.

There was a slight nod against her shoulder. "Angie told me yesterday," she said.

"Oh," was all Trish could think to say in response. It wasn't like it was the end of the world – they would have to find out sometime. But, for some reason, Trish felt guilty. Maybe it was the broken tone in the young voice that was toying with her emotions.

"Can I ask you something?" Whether because of sleep or something else, the question came out in a squeaky whisper, completely sincere and open.

"Of course, Sweetie," Trish answered in the same, still whisper.

There was a hesitant silence and then the tiny clearing of a throat. "What did he do? I mean, why did you guys break up?"

Unexpected tears sprang to Trish's eyes as she tried to think of the best way to answer that question. What could she possibly say that a fourteen-year-old would understand. "Well," she sighed and then wiggled her hips a little bit, in an attempt to resituate herself. "First of all, it wasn't anything he did," she started.

"Was it us?" the young brunette asked, her eyes wide as she shifted on the bed until she was facing her father's former lover. Trish's face echoed her shock, because the girl looked down at the sheets and then back. "Because first he divorced my mom, and then Angie, and now you guys break up. And you all say that it wasn't his fault, but the only other people who have been there since the beginning were my sister and me. So if it's not Dad's fault, then it's ours, right?"

She shook her head. Maybe it was true – maybe it was the girls that Trish had been running from, but that wasn't their fault. It wasn't their fault that she hadn't grown up enough to be what they needed. "No, no, no. Listen to me, okay?" Deep brown eyes, just like her dad's, stared back at Trish and she nearly lost her nerve. "What happened with your dad and me? It was complicated and it was all kinda fucked up," she stopped and cringed.

The teenager before her giggled and shook her head. "It's fine. I've said "fucked up" a few times," she assured.

Trish smiled at the innocence of the face looked back at her. All she wanted in that moment was to preserve that innocence, to protect her from anything and everything bad that would ever try to corrupt that smile and those eyes. "But it doesn't change the fact that I think you and your sister are the coolest chicks in the world, okay? It doesn't change the fact that I still love hangin' out with you guys when you come to visit."

There was a long pause and Trish wondered if she had said the right thing. She always found herself second-guessing every word and action when she was with the girls. "Believe me, Trish, I know why you're with John," she finally said. "I mean, he's gorgeous, and he's way cooler than my dad. But I still kinda wish that you were Dad's girlfriend, ya know?"

Trish smiled sympathetically and put a hand on the girl's shoulder. "But we can still chill, even if I'm not dating your dad," she winked. "I mean, I won't be your step mom or anything, but I can be your friend, right?" she offered.

The smile that she gave said that she agreed. But then she bit her lip and scrunched her nose a little bit. "So there's no chance that you're gonna get back together with him?" Trish shook her head sadly. "Dammit," the girl sighed, turning around in the bed and leaning against the head board. "So that means John's not gonna be single again any time soon?"

Dave was greeted by the laughter of his daughter and his ex-girlfriend when he returned to his suite at that moment. He'd had a good time with John, avoided the subject of Trish altogether, and remembered exactly why they had been friends to begin with. But upon hearing those joyous sounds from the other room, he felt his heart crashing back into his chest, shattering on impact.

In the car, he had convinced himself that the situation was the way it was supposed to be. John was a good guy, and there was no one else he would trust to keep Trish happy for the rest of her life. He would just have to accept that and move on, maybe take some time to get to know his daughters again. Maybe it was the best time for him to stop worrying about what a horrible boyfriend he had been, and try to remedy what a terrible father he had been since becoming the World Heavyweight Champion.

His schedule had picked up so quickly that it had ruined his marriage before he even had time to realize it was in trouble. And now he had the chance to make up for some lost time with the two young women in the world that he knew still loved him. He had decided, in the taxi, that he was only going to focus on that relationship for awhile. He would just let the other stuff work itself out.

Pushing through the pain that the laughter invoked, he knocked on the bedroom door and waited for an invitation to enter.

It took nearly a full minute for his oldest daughter opened the door with a mischievous grin. "Hey, Dad," she waved slightly, sending Trish into another fit of giggles.

"What's goin' on in here?" he asked, a smile tweaking the corners of his lips. The younger girl would sleep through an earthquake, he was convinced, as he watched her splayed across the rumpled sheets of his bed. Trish sat beside her, surrounded by candy wrappers and an empty pizza box, along with a few pop cans and plastic cups. "Damn!" He looked at his daughter. "Did you guys have a party?"

She wiggled her dark eyebrows at her dad and then turned to walk back to the bed. "Wouldn't you like to know?" she asked.

Trish struggled to stand and then walked to the end of the bed. "And I think that's my cue to leave," she grinned, her foot catching on the corner of the bedspread and sending her forward with a lurch.

Dave didn't think, only moved to catch her. But once she was in his arms, staring up into his eyes, he realized what a mistake it had been. Twenty minutes after swearing off women all together, he could feel himself stiffening. _Jesus_, he scolded himself, setting Trish's feet on the floor, _your kids are in the room, ya pervert. Stop thinking about fucking Trish! _

She moved past him and he pointed to the girl on his bed, now wide awake. "Clean this crap up," he ordered. She rolled her eyes, but did as she was told while her father moved into the living room. "Thanks," he said as Trish gathered her purse and headed for the door.

She leaned against the heavy wood and stared up at him, so far up. He was so beautiful. And the way she had felt him react to holding her a minute ago had her own body doing things she didn't want to think about. "It was no problem," she grinned sincerely. "She knows, by the way," Trish nodded toward the bedroom. Dave's eyes clouded, but she held a hand up to stop him. "Angie told her," she informed, before he could go off on her.

With a heavy sigh, he ran a hand over his hair and put the other on his hip. "I was gonna tell 'em, Trish. But I haven't really seen them since the last time you went home with me, and I didn't want to do it over the phone," he rambled.

Pushing off the door, she put a hand on his face and rubbed his cheek with her thumb. "It's okay," she assured him. "But make sure they know none of this was their fault, okay?"

"They know it wasn't their fault," he stated, as though that were the craziest notion he'd ever heard.

But Trish brushed her finger over his lip and then withdrew her hand. "All they know is that they're the only ones who have been there for all three of your heart breaks, Dave. If you don't tell them, they don't know that you don't blame them," she explained. It took everything she had not to tell him to fuckin' talk to someone in his life before he lost all of them.

He didn't answer with words, of course, just an understanding nod. Trish turned for the door handle and then threw one more glance over her shoulder. "Maybe before they go home, we could all do something together?"

She left before he could tell her there wasn't a chance in hell that he was spending any more time with the three of them than he had to. In his reality, those girls in his bed barely spoke to him when he begged them to, and Trish was about to strip naked for one of his best friends. As he unbuttoned his shirt and moved toward the couch, he prayed that sleep would come quickly. In his dreams, Trish was in his arms and his daughters thought he was the coolest dad in the world. That's where he wanted to be at the moment, more than anything.


	11. Rising and Recessing Tides

**Her Head v. Her Heart**

_A/N: Thanks for the reviews, you guys. You've all had such awesome things to say about this story, and I appreciate it more than you can possibly know. I know that I say that all the time, but I really mean it. Writing is my passion, and I would do it for myself, even if no one cared to read it. But I love that my humble musings are striking a chord with one person, let alone all of you who have voiced your opinions. I wish that I owned Cena, because he would have no need for throwbacks, or shirts of any kind. He would also be rockin' those hats and visors backwards all the fuckin' time. Sadly, I don't. And I don't own Trish or Dave, either. Enjoy the show!

* * *

_

Life had been compared to a roller coaster, a journey, a bowl of cherries, and a box of chocolates. Trish thought it was more like an ocean. The waves of human drama would swell without warning, stirring up the mundane sediment of daily life, creating muddy chaos in its wake. But it would settle, eventually. The tides would recess, and life always got back to normal in time.

Her relationship with John had gone from new and fragile to comfortable and stable in the last month or so, and Trish found herself spending more and more of her life off the road at his house. They had settled into the routine of being a couple, and she was happy with the permanent, yet fluffy, relationship they had. They didn't give much time to long discussions about the future, but both were content with a day-to-day partnership.

She had yet to shove Dave all the way to the back of her mind, but he no longer dominated the forefront of her thoughts. If she was honest, she was grateful that he had finally asked out a woman from the wardrobe department and seemed to be happily moving on. He didn't spend many nights in bars with the group anymore, but Trish told herself that was for the best. The less time she had to spend with Dave, the better off she and John would be.

Reclining comfortably on John's bed, dressed only in one of his enormous throwback football jerseys, Trish's reading was interrupted by the ringing of her cell phone. John was downstairs, in his office, doing a phone interview for his upcoming film. So why was his number showing up on her caller ID? "Hello?" she answered.

"Hey, come down here for a second," John's voice sounded distracted.

She rolled her eyes. "You really that lazy, Champ?" she asked, setting her book down and stretching her legs in front of her and wiggling her toes slowly.

He chuckled and groaned. "I'm hungry," he whined.

Trish yawned and looked at the clock beside the bed. "Somethin' wrong with your legs?" she asked.

"I got one more interview to tape for some radio station," he explained. "Can you just bring me popcorn or something?"

She smiled as she realized that she was getting out of bed to fix a snack for her man at ten o'clock at night. The old Trish would have told him to fuck himself – he was an adult and he could get his own damned food. But as she skipped down the stairs and headed toward the kitchen, she found herself glad for the opportunity just to see him for a few minutes. Even if he was busy with a million other things, she was excited about watching him do what he loved for just a little while.

With a bowl of microwave popcorn and a beer in hand, she set off for the office and pushed the door open with her hip. A wide grin stretched across her face as she watched him listen to whatever the journalist on the other end of the phone was saying. He winked when she entered, and mouthed a "thank you," before sweeping his eyes over her body appreciatively. "Sorry. What was that again?" he blinked and turned his attention back to the telephone.

Trish sank to the couch in front of his desk and watched him. He wore baggy, basketball shorts, and a Red Sox hat rested backwards on his newly shaved head. He was completely relaxed as he fielded the interviewer's questions and replayed several anecdotes for his, or her, listening pleasure. This man, so completely at ease with himself and everyone around him, was the man that she loved.

When he finally hung up the phone and pushed back from the desk, Trish moved over on the couch and made room for him to sink onto the seat beside her. Instead, he lifted her tiny body into his arms and held her close to his bare chest. "Thanks," he smiled, kissing her nose as she wrapped her legs around his waist and rested her heels against his ass.

She kissed his neck as he carried her up the stairs and toward the bedroom. "You smell good," she groaned into his ear.

Throwing her on the bed, John stood back with his hands on his hips. "Hold that thought," he smiled wickedly. "First, I have to pack."

Laughing, Trish watched him turn toward the closet and stopped and stared at the plethora of clothing at his disposal. "Open your suitcase, baby," she instructed. "Show 'em where to go. Maybe they'll just jump in there on their own."

Her giggle made him turn and lunge, landing face first next to her on the bed. "You know you wanna help me, right?" She shook her head and rested her legs on his back while he turned his face toward her, puppy dog eyes in full effect. "Come on, Baby. It'll be fun. You can pack my clothes. And then you can pack yours."

Even though she would have to sacrifice her three days of free time, she wanted to go on his mini-publicity tour with him. She wanted to see him "wow" the talk-show and concert audiences like she knew only he could. But even her free time was booked pretty solid as the Women's Champion, and she had to shake her head. Repositioning herself, she straddled his back and started to run her fingernails down naked skin. "Wish I could," she told him as he moaned under the pressure of her fingers.

"You can," he insisted, raising himself to his knees. Trish tried to wrap her arms around his waist, but couldn't stop herself from falling to her back on the mattress. In less than a second, John was on top of her, resting his weight on his elbows as he hovered above her. "I'm the WWE Champ, Baby. If I say you can come with me, you can," he winked.

She watched his piercing gaze and almost forgot what they had been talking about. "I have a couple of interviews, a photo shoot, and three appearances to make between now and Saturday's house show," she rattled off her schedule as she wound her arms around his neck and pulled his face closer to hers.

John licked his lips and lowered his face to hers, accepting a deep, hungry kiss, before pulling back. "I can always pack in the morning," he growled as his hands found their way under the hem of the jersey she was draped in.

Trish closed her eyes and shut off her brain, allowing her nerve endings to do the thinking for her. Her mind was over-analytical and caused problems. But if she thought with her heart, John was everything she had ever wanted or needed. Her feelings and emotions told her that this was exactly where she was supposed to be at this moment in her life – and this moment was all that mattered to her anymore.


	12. Old Habits Die Hard

**Her Head v. Her Heart**

**(Caution: This chapter contains "mature" content.)**

_A/N: Jesus, this turned out a lot longer than I expected. Um, I probably should have broken this up into two chapters, but there was really no place to put a chapter break. I hope you guys don't mind. I should let you all know that the Chain Gang has really stepped up and made their voices heard in the reviews after the last couple of chapters, but Dave is still dominating the popular vote. Probably because **Stratusfied** voted for him seven times in one review! I'm not bitchin', though - I think you're fanatic support for the couple is bad ass! Keep showing the love. I don't usually do individual thank-you's because I don't want to miss anyone and make them feel like their reviews aren't important to me - but, despite the death threats over the ending of my last story, I want to say that **Little-Miss-Rachel**, **RKOxLegendKiller**, and **TrishOrton **have been great to review everything I write on a totally consistent basis. Check out their stories, a'ight? But not until after you've read, and reviewed, this chapter, of course! And y'all know that I don't own Trish or Dave - I just play with their emotions for my own sick and twisted pleasure.

* * *

_

Being the Women's Champion was fun for Trish. Not just because it meant she was the best female wrestler in the world, or at least the WWE, but because she got a chance to meet real heroes. She got to go to hospitals and meet people who really fought for their lives on a regular basis. She got to talk to junior high and high school girls about being strong women. And she got to show her appreciation for all of the fans who allowed her to be everything she had always dreamed of being.

What was not fun for her was sharing a limo with the World Heavyweight Champion, a thick cloud of suffocating silence hanging over them as they rode from the WWE headquarters to the children's hospital of the day. When they had met in the lobby, Dave had greeted her with a handshake and a quick "hello," but then went about saying his good-byes to his new girlfriend, Mandy. Or was it Sandy? Maybe it was Bambi? Trish couldn't remember and she didn't really care.

It wasn't so much jealousy of his new relationship, as it was a preservation of their old one. When she broke up with him, she had known that he would move on eventually, and she was glad that he had. It didn't mean that she wanted to watch the lovebirds in wide screen surround sound. She didn't want to see him touching this new woman, saying things to her, kissing her, and looking at her the same way he had always touched, talked, kissed, and looked at Trish. It was disrespectful to everything they had shared.

Of course, thinking it in her head was completely different than saying the words out loud. So, instead, she settled for pouting in the limo as they headed for Long Island. After only fifteen minutes, though, she pulled out her cell phone. Fuck this awkwardness. She was going to talk to someone who actually still enjoyed her company.

The phone rang twice and then went to voice mail. But before Trish had a chance to leave a rambling message for her man, she felt a large hand taking the phone from her ear. Turning confused eyes to Dave, she saw him smirk and flip it closed.

He licked his lips and nervously patted the belt over his knee while handing her cell back. "Not today. Please?"

She nodded in agreement, still stunned at his previous actions. She had never seen him do anything so forward in all the time she had known him. "Is something wrong?" she asked.

Dave shook his head and let his gaze drift out the window. Nothing was wrong. In fact, nothing had been this right in a long time. He was talking to his daughters nearly every day on the phone, and they were calling him when he missed a scheduled check-in. He had an amazing girlfriend who understood his love for family and a regular life, because she had a son of her own to think about. He was in the place he had always wanted to be. He just wasn't in it with the woman he loved.

"Then are we gonna talk?" Trish asked, interrupting his silence once again. "Because this silence sucks ass."

This time, he laughed. He had nearly forgotten how much she could sound just like his fourteen-year-old daughter sometimes. "Um, sure," he agreed with a nod and another smile, which she returned, opening an old wound that he thought was finally starting to heal. "How's it goin' with you?" He inwardly kicked himself for bein' so damned idiotic.

Trish felt like the limo had slowed to a crawl. _How's it goin' with you?_ That's what they had come to? _Jesus_. "Um, good. Busy, but good," she answered, and then mentally rapt herself in the back of the head. "And you?"

He nodded in response. "So, Randy and Stacy, huh?" he tried again, but knew that he just ended up sounding like a bigger dolt. Ten months in a relationship with this woman and all he could think to ask her now was something about their friends? His kids were right – he was the lamest guy in the world.

Trish rolled her eyes though, and looked out the window at the passing scenery. "For now," she said flippantly and then turned, picking an imaginary piece of fuzz of the hem of her dress. "Randy's month of fidelity is almost up, though," she added.

It was true – Randy wasn't really all that good at the whole "commitment" thing, but Dave knew that it would be different this time. "I think it's for real this time," he stated. "I mean, he fucked it up before and he knows that. He's trying," he defended his friend and then shook his head when Trish raised an eyebrow his direction. "What?" he shrugged. "It's all the kid fuckin' talks about anymore. It's annoying, really," he added with another smirk.

Damn that smirk. It turned Trish's insides to a goopy puddle of sap every time. But she held to the fact that he seemed far more interested in Randy and Stacy's relationship than he had ever been in theirs. "Yeah. I'm sure guys that talk about their relationships piss you off, huh?"

"What does that mean?" He knew that he sounded angry, but he was more confused than anything. What was she talking about?

The words weren't supposed to come out of her mouth. Those thoughts were living in her head – never to see the light of day. He was supposed to figure out why she had left him all on his own. He was supposed to see the error of his ways and find a way to make it up to her. They were not supposed to have this fight. "Nevermind."

He found that he couldn't let it go, though. The look on her face, coupled with the biting nature of her words, made him wonder if this was the answer to all of his questions, the key to the mess that was the end of their relationship. "No, wait a minute," he turned his body toward her, leaning against the door of the car. "You want to say something? Say it, Trish."

_Fuck it_, Trish thought as she turned also, flipping her hair behind her shoulders. "You're not exactly the most gregarious individual on the planet, Dave," she shot. "I mean, you don't like to talk all that much," she started to explain.

He shook his head and held up a hand. "I know what 'gregarious' means, Trish," he informed her. "I talk," he added.

"No, you don't. You don't talk. Not about important stuff, and especially not about relationships. You're like Fort Knox when it comes to your feelings." She could feel her voice rising, but she was no longer trying to conceal her emotions. Maybe he needed to hear this. "It's not that you don't say things the right way, or the wrong way. You just don't say shit, at all. You don't even try."

He absorbed the verbal thrashing, the accusations rattling around inside his head. Normally, he would measure his words and make sure that he didn't say anything that he would later regret. But he was tired of censoring himself, and he was tired of letting his head do all the talking. He raised a fist and then lowered it to the seat beside him. "So I don't say a lot," he admitted. "You know why, Trish? Because words are bull shit. Because people who talk about their feelings only do it so they don't have to act on them. Because people lie," he gritted his teeth and watched her eyes grow wide.

He wanted to put on the brakes, but found that shattering a dam nearly ten years in the building wasn't possible. "People that say they love you, leave you. People say that they'll do anything to make sure that your relationship works out, but then they bail when it actually gets hard. Words like forever, and commitment, and support are fuckin' easy to pronounce, Trish," he watched her slink back in her seat and noticed that the driver had raised the privacy window between his passengers and himself. "There's people that talk about it, and people who be about it, right?"

Her stomach fell to her toes as he used her boyfriend's patented catch phrase, but then it jumped into her throat as she looked at the pain in his eyes. "Yeah," she tried to retaliate, knowing that her words were shakey, "well, I think people who don't let their partner know how they're feeling are just as weak as people who talk too much," she spat.

His face started turning red and he raised a finger, his voice a hissing whisper. "Don't you dare ever imply that you were not the center of my world. I may not have said the words, but I busted my ass to show you that I loved you. I did things for you that I have never done for any other woman on the face of the planet. I have been married twice, Trish," he clenched his fists at his sides again and narrowed his eyes in her direction. "Two times to two women who I never, NEVER, let as far inside me as you got." He punched the back of his seat with enough force to make the leather creak loudly and then looked back at her with a firey expression she had never seen before. "I have thought about our break up a hundred times over the last three months, Trish, and I know that I have fucked a lot of shit up in my life. But you and I were not one of them. I didn't do this – I didn't ruin this. All I ever did was love you, more than anyone I have ever met in my entire life, and you walked away. Do not blame this one me."

Tears sprang from her eyes without any warning. She couldn't look at him anymore – she couldn't bear the anger that was penetrating her through his gaze. Drawing her knees up to her chest in the seat, she wrapped her arms around her legs and buried her face, trying her best to stop the pain. He wasn't supposed to see her like this. It was an admission of guilt, and she wasn't ready to admit that this empty ache in her soul was her fault. She wasn't ready to admit that the void still existed.

"Trish," Dave's voice was sweet and hushed all of the sudden. She refused to meet his eye, even when he reached across the seat and put a hand on her knee. "Trish, don't do this," he pleaded.

She knew he hated it, more than anything, when she cried, but she couldn't help it. She was trying to stop, but she was beyond the point of no return now. It was stupid. She was happy with John and their life was good. She was where she wanted to be. She had no reason to cry about anything, and yet. . .

"Baby," his voice was next to her ear now as she looked down and gave an involuntary chuckle through her tears. The World Heavyweight Champion, all six feet and five inches, and all three hundred pounds of him, were seated on the floor of the limousine, leaning against the door and pulling her tiny body into his embrace. "I thought you couldn't do this to me anymore," he whispered as she leaned back and looked into his dark eyes.

Every nerve ending in her body came to life as she sat close to the heated body she still dreamt about at night. Not all the time – she was getting used to John, and missing Dave's caress less and less. But sometimes, when she least expected it, a longing would creep in. She did her best to shut them out, never entertained the fantasies anymore, but at that moment, it was impossible. She could feel his breath on her face, his chest against hers, his legs supporting her back. And she could feel him under her, hardening at the proximity, though his face said he didn't want it to happen.

Her body moved of it's own volition, as her trembling fingers reached to his face and stroked his cheek. "I know it was all my fault," she admitted.

He shook his head, but he didn't correct her. He didn't say things that he didn't mean – his conscious was clear. He had done everything he could do to make their relationship work. He was confident in the fact that nothing he could have done would have made it better. But he didn't want to see her shoulders sagging with that guilt that seemed to weigh her down completely.

"No, it was," Trish admitted, sniffling back a stray tear before she added her other hand to his face, now holding him completely still. "It was all my fault, Dave. Every bit of it was all me. I didn't mean to hurt you, but I wasn't," she started.

He cut her off the only way he knew how. By pressing his lips firmly to hers. It was so wrong – for both of them. It would only make things ten times more complicated. But he had never wanted anything as badly as he wanted Trish at that moment. She had never been so lovely as she was right then, sitting in his lap, her eyes rimmed red with the tears she had cried over the end of them.

She groaned as he wrapped his arms around her back and pulled her flush against his body. There was no time for the extensive foreplay and torturously slow pleasure, and it wasn't what either of them needed at the moment. She fumbled with his belt and then the button of his tailored dress pants. When she had conquered the more complicated of the fasteners, she slid his zipper down and snaked her hand inside his pants.

Dave threw his head back as Trish gripped him in her fist and then smiled in ecstasy at the sound of her pleasured moaning. He kept telling himself that he had a girlfriend to go back home to, but as his fingers held Trish's skirt to her waist and she slid her panties to the side, he didn't fuckin' care. He didn't care about anything as she lowered herself onto him and began to flex her thighs and rotate her hips. Nobody, not Brandy or either of his ex-wives, could do the things to him that Trish could do.

Trish leaned back and rested against Dave's knees as she let her body feel and stopped worrying about how wrong this was. It didn't change anything, really. She would still get out of this car, play the smiling diva for all of the cute little kids who thought she was all things 'heroic.' And in three days, she would meet up with John, and she would be his girlfriend again. But for now, she needed this. She needed to feel the passion that only he could give her. She needed the spark that only he could ignite inside of her, even after more than three months apart.

They had both reached a frenzied, and loud, climax when they felt the car slowing to a stop. Avoiding eye contact, they both straightened their expensive clothing and checked to make sure there was no "evidence" of their previous activity. There was a long silence as each tried to fathom the weight of what they had just done.

"I'm not going to apologize for that," Dave stated finally, looking out the tinted window to the large hospital beside the car.

Trish nodded and ran a brush through her hair. "I'm not, either," she determined.

"It's never gonna be like that with anyone else," he smirked again, trying to catch his breath as he finally turned and caught her eyes. "But it's just sex, right?" Trish nodded, her expression blank. "So if we don't tell anyone," he trailed off.

"Then no one has to get hurt?" Trish finally asked, knowing that it would never work. These arrangements hadn't worked for anyone she had ever known, and she had no reason to think that it would work for her. But, damn, it was good sex.

The limo driver opened the door for them, his expression stoic. It wasn't be the first time he'd heard the two champions using their commute time for something other than business. With a hand on the small of her back, Dave leaned over and whispered in her ear as a few fans snapped pictures of them. "I got some free time in about two hours."

A shudder ran up her spine at the gruff sound of his voice, mixed with the subtle scent of his cologne. "I don't know. I mean, sex in a limo is just so," Trish searched for the word. "Evolution?"

His face twisted for a split second as they walked through the front doors of the building. An event coordinator for the hospital and a rep from the WWE approached them and Dave took a quick look around the lobby as the two were given itineraries and a run-down of the afternoon's schedule. "So, if you'll come with me, Miss Stratus," a middle-aged woman in purple scrubs nodded toward one of the halls. "We'll meet up in the rec room in an hour?" she asked the other hospital employee.

"See ya in an hour, Champ," Trish winked at Dave, and then swallowed a screech as he gave her ass a pat and followed his tour guide down another corridor.

Biting her lip, she told herself that it wasn't that bad. It was just sex. Once they got back to Stamford, and Dave was back with Brandy, it would stop. Once she was back on the road with John, she would have no need for it anymore. Everything was under control. She could handle this. She could handle this.


	13. Orgasms and Other Stuff

**Her Head v. Her Heart**

_A/N: Alright, Chuckle Monkies. It appears that some of us have boarded the crazy train, destination: Wonky Town, co-conductors **YouThinkYouNoeMe** (20 votes for Trish and Dave) and **chainganghottie54** (58 fuckin' votes for Trish and John). I am so seriously flattered by all of your reviews, but the thing that makes me even happier is that you are all so passionate about who you want to come out on top in this story. You make me feel like I'm doing my job because you're all so into it. I love that and I seriously appreciate it more than you know. I don't own 'em, I just use 'em to torture all of you. Enjoy!

* * *

_

Since she started dating John, and even before that, Trish had seen her "Girl Time" seriously diminish. Other than an occasional night out with a large group, there wasn't much time for socializing. And even then, there were boyfriends present and no chance for real "gossip." Though she had always loved the prospect of getting together with Lita and Stacy and trading "dirty little secrets," the last month had made it miss it more than ever.

"I love photo shoots," Lita spat sarcastically, sinking to the floor between Trish and Stacy. They were all made up, and costumed, with nothing to do now but wait.

"It may be the only time I ever say this, but I'm actually thankful," Trish pointed a tortilla chip at the set, where Christy and Candice were posing for a picture, "for those Diva Search skanks," she bit into her snack as she watched the newbies.

Stacy stretched her long legs and fought the urge to lick the gloss from her lips. Her eyes were starting to burn from excessive liner, and her lips felt greasy. She hated make up more than any other part of these shoots. "You look tired, Trish," she smiled sympathetically. "Not bad, just tired," she added quickly.

It was so like Stacy to cover any criticism with a compliment, and Trish found herself smiling, even though the practice made her cringe. She appreciated it, the way her friend cared so deeply for other people's feelings, but sometimes she just wished that Stacy would say what she meant and stand by it. "I just haven't gotten a lot of sleep lately," she admitted.

"Why?" Lita asked, her voice flat and uninterested.

There was something there, just under the surface, that made Trish wonder if her friends knew what she had been doing. It wasn't something that anyone else would catch, but these were her girls, her two best friends, and she had a knack for hearing even the things they didn't say. "Just had a lot on my mind," she defended. "What?"

Stacy shrugged and reached into her bag, withdrawing a bottle of lotion. She worked the Sweet Pea scent into her hands and wrists as she spoke. "We already know you're sleepin' with Dave," she said simply.

Trish's heart sank as she met both sets of eyes staring back at her in anticipation. "How?" was all she asked. Denying it was pointless, they knew. But it wasn't compassion that she found staring back at her. Upon further inspection, she noticed that both women looked hurt. Why hadn't she just trusted her two best friends with something so huge?

Lita looked most upset. "Does it matter how?" she asked seriously. "If we found out, how long do you think it's gonna be before John does?" With a shake of her head, Lita leveled Trish with a glare, angry, like the blonde had never seen before. "You say you love him, Trish, but you're gonna hurt him anyway."

The raw emotion in the red head's eyes threw Trish off. What happened to 'non-judgemental' Lita? The one who never looked at her like she was some two-dollar ho? "What the hell, Li?" she asked defensively. "I thought you got it? I thought you understood," she started in.

But the Southern punk queen struggled to her feet and shook her head, holding up a hand to stop Trish from arguing. "I do get it, Trish. I love Edge." Her eyes clouded with something indecipherable. "But I regret, everyday, what I did to Matt. He deserved so much better than what I did to him," she turned on her heel, but then stopped and looked back. "So does John." And she was gone.

Trish stared after her, unsure of what to say. She had seen Lita angry with one of the other divas, or with Matt, or Edge. She had even seen Lita get upset at management or fans. But she had never seen Lita pissed at her. She licked her lips and bit another chip, hoping for anything to take her mind off of the guilty feeling in her stomach.

"I know you're gonna find this hard to believe," Stacy started, sliding over to fill the space that the red head had left, "but I know how you feel."

Trish's eyebrow shot up in a challenge. "You do?" Stacy 'I've never done anything wrong in my life' Kiebler thought she knew what Trish was going through?

"You remember Test, right?" Trish snorted and almost asked who didn't remember Stacy and Test, but thought better and just nodded. "I love Randy, Trish. More than I know that I should. And he can do things to my body that I don't think Test could spell," she grinned like the Cheshire cat and then shook her head when she noted the confused look on Trish's face. "But it doesn't matter how many different roads Randy knows to Happy Land, he's not Test," she admitted.

"Are you saying that Test was a better fuck than Randy?" Trish shook her head. "Seriously?"

Stacy blushed, as though she wasn't sure she should be disclosing such information, and then nodded. "I don't know what it is, Trish. I mean, Randy's amazing. He's just," she stopped, as though searching for a word, and then met Trish's dark eyes. "He's layable." She chuckled slightly. "Test was lickable, and Randy's layable. Not a lot of difference," she said.

"But enough," Trish finished, staring at the floor. That was the problem. John was everything she wanted at that very moment – he was completely layable. But Dave was, and would always be, lickable beyond description. He would always be the originator of "lickable" and there was nothing either of them could do to change that.

"So, Stace," Trish's focus snapped up sharply, surprising her friend for a moment, "how do you deal with it? I mean, how can you know that there is someone out there who can set your entire world on fire for uninterrupted hours on end, and then settle for something else?"

Stacy nodded, an empathetic look in her eyes as she drew her knees up to her chest and stared into space, pondering the question. When she spoke, it was as if she had drifted somewhere far away. "I never really forget how it was with Test. I mean, I don't think about it all the time or anything, but sometimes it'll hit me. When I don't expect it. Sometimes I'll be in the ring. Sometimes I'm backstage. Sometimes I'm at home, just watching a movie or something, and I remember. The little hairs on the back of my neck stand up. I start to get a little sweaty. It's hard to breathe.

"And then Randy shows up." She let out a half-laugh, almost to herself, and then looked at her friend, more honesty and sincerity in her eyes than Trish had ever seen. "And I know who I'm supposed to be with. I mean, yeah, Test was really great with the orgasms. But Randy's not exactly a slouch, ya know?" She licked her lips and winked, trying to draw something resembling a smile out of her friend. "Look, Trish, I don't know what to tell you, because I know it's an impossible decision. But I know that, for me? All of Randy's other qualities overshadow the _slight_ deficiency in the bedroom."

Trish stared at the wall as the photographer called Stacy up. John was everything she wanted, on the exact same page from the beginning. He was perfect for her. Now all she had to do was decide if his other qualities overshadowed the fact that he wasn't Dave in the bedroom.


	14. Losing Dignity, Keeping Trish

**Her Head v. Her Heart**

_A/N: As you can probably tell, this is chapter fourteen. And as you have all be forewarned, the next chapter is the last. I'm posting it today on purpose, because I won't have another chance to post the last chapter until Sunday night. This gives you the rest of today (Tuesday), all of Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and most of Sundayto send me your votes on who's winning Trish's head and heart in the final installment. I know you can only review once, so feel free to shoot me an e-mail and let me know what you think, if once is not enough. Also, to **Brittany**, who suggested two endings to make everyone happy: I actually thought about that back when I started this story, and I had two ideas, but now I think I need one decisive conclusion, or else I've had everyone voting like mad for no reason. The vote, as I have counted it, stands at Batista 72; Cena 84. You guys are amazing me, every time I open my mail to find your passionate reviews. Thanks so much - you're the best ever. And I just posted a disclaimer in the last chapter, but in case you forgot or something - I don't own John or Dave. Wish I did - I can only imagine how great that would be - but I do not. And, as always, enjoy!_

Not for the first time, he wondered how long he could continue to tolerate their arrangement. Each pretending that whatever was going on had no bearing on them or their futures. He knew he'd never let another girl get away with what she was trying to pull. But she wasn't any other girl. She was Trish Stratus, and he loved her. The fact that she was still sleeping with her ex on the side was not okay. But John wasn't sure he was ready to lose her because of it, either. He knew it was weak, but he didn't care. Even if all he had was a piece of her, he wasn't sure he'd be okay without even that.

So he bit his tongue and tried to ignore the signs. Though subtle, there were signs that only a man in love would recognize. She always wanted to have sex, as though to assure him that she wanted him, but she never opened her eyes to look at him. She always held his hand a little tighter when Dave was around, as though to assure John that there was nothing going on. She would call him in the middle of the day, just to say that she loved him, in case he was worrying that she was off with Dave.

As the days went on, and Trish didn't leave, John tried to convince himself that he was doing the right thing. It didn't feel right anymore, but neither did the thought of losing her. He tried to remain civil with Dave, but that was becoming harder and harder to do. When they would go to dinner, or carpool to the next city, or lift together in the gym, John always found himself wondering why.

Why did Trish want Dave still? She had told him, several times, that Dave was too serious, too settled, and too responsible for her. So why did she keep going back? Why did she claim to leave Dave because he never said he loved her, but when John said it all the time, he still came up short? Why were his words never enough? And why did his actions seem to mean even less? Why did every expression she shot him these days feel guilty? And why wouldn't she just tell him the truth?

He was ready to forgive her – all she had to do was ask him to. But he knew that she wouldn't. If anyone was going to bring this situation into the light, it was going to have to be him. So, as he and Dave spotted each other on free weights at the company training facility, he decided to do just that.

"So, Vegas this weekend, huh?" John asked as Dave benched 400 and nodded, his teeth clenched tightly. "You got big plans?"

Another hiss of air escaped Dave's lips as he sat the weights back in their place above his head and sat, his face red. "Nah, man," he finally said, grabbing a towel from the floor to wipe the sweat from his face. "Just work," he added.

John nodded and sank to another bench beside him, drinking from an athletic drink he had brought along. "No gambling? Strip clubs?" He shrugged and sat the bottle down as he asked, "Fucking my girlfriend?"

The room, which had been bathed in the sounds of a heavy hip-hop beat moments ago, seemed to grow deathly silent, the music fading at the end of the disc. Dave stared with wide eyes at John, while John stared at the floor. He couldn't bare to look in the face of his "friend" when he knew the truth would be staring back. "How did you –" Dave started.

Standing, John picked up a fifteen pound barbell and threw it across the room. It crashed against a treadmill and fell the floor with a thud. "How did _you_?" he asked, his voice coming out as a spit of anger. He hadn't expected to get emotional, but he also hadn't expected such a blatant admission. In fact, he had been hoping Dave would deny it all – then maybe he could convince himself that he had dreamed the whole thing up. "After all that bull shit about how I make her happy? About you just wanted her to be happy? Look at me," John demanded when Dave's gaze started toward the floor. "Answer me."

There was no answer, and Dave knew it. This is why he never talked – because words were lies. He did want Trish to be happy, but he wanted Trish to be happy with him. He wanted her to come back to him, to lay with him at night and laugh about whatever ridiculous signs they had seen in the crowd at that night's show, or whatever roadside attractions they had seen on the trip to that night's city. He wanted her to be his girl, to come home to him and stay all night, to wake up in his arms in the morning, to wear his shirts while she cooked breakfast or got ready to take a shower.

"What was I gonna do, John? Admit that I was still in love with her? That I still wanted her?" Dave finally asked. "She left me – she was over it. It wasn't my place to say who she could date or couldn't. I did want her to be happy," he insisted. It was still all he really wanted.

"She is," John seethed, his fists clenching and unclenching at his sides. "I know you want to believe that you're better for her, and maybe you are, man. I don't know. What I do know is that I love Trish, and if you want her, you're gonna have to beat me into the ground for her," he laid down the challenge before he stopped to think about it. Had he thought, he would have realized that Dave could do so much more than beat him into the ground. But they were talking about Trish, and when it came to her? John didn't think first.

"I don't wanna fight you, man," Dave chuckled, standing and holding up his hands. "Look, the thing is – I'm happy with Brandy and Trish loves you. The thing with us is just sex. So if you want me to back off," he held up his hands.

John shrugged. "Man, look," he finally said, his shoulders sagging as he decided to try another route, "I ain't never felt this way 'bout no one. She makes me crazy," he laughed and Dave nodded in acknowledgement. "I'm gonna ask her to marry me in Vegas," he added.

Dave's heart sank to his toes, even as he gave his friend a congratulatory smile. It was bittersweet, the admission, even if he had expected it. If John asked her and she said "no," his friend would be shattered, and Dave knew how that felt. It also meant that he might stand a chance of getting the love of his life back. On the other hand, if John asked her and she said "yes," it would mean that two people he really cared about were really happy together, and that was a good thing. Of course, it also meant that his chances with Trish were over and done forever. "I hope it goes well, man. Maybe I can ask Brandy, too. We can have a big, double wedding in the fall," he tried to joke around the sinking feeling in his chest.

But John shook his head. "Nah, man. I wanna marry Trish in Vegas. This weekend." He left before Dave could say anything else. He wasn't sure he was really ready to get married, but he loved Trish. And he wanted to be with her eventually. Why not just start sooner than later?


	15. Rain, Epiphanies, Happy Endings

**Her Head v. Her Heart**

_A/N: As promised, the much-anticipated ending of Head v. Heart is here. I hope you guys like it. Oh, and please stay tuned at the end of this episode for an important message. . . (p.s. I just spent, like, a hundred bucks on jewelry this weekend, so I'm way more broke than I was before - clearly, I own none of these characters.) Enjoy!

* * *

_

What happened in Vegas was supposed to stay in Vegas. Trish didn't know for sure, but she hoped to God that was true. She hoped that she could leave Dave's harsh words from the two nights ago in Vegas. And she hoped she could leave John's proposal in Vegas. And she really hoped that she could leave their explosive fight in Vegas. She hoped that she could hit the road tomorrow and everything would be just as it was.

But even as she walked through the emptying streets of the Strip at six o'clock in the morning, she knew that nothing would ever be as it was. Heading into Sin City, she had only three fears. In just over twenty-four hours, they had all come true. Dave had ended their affair. She had lost the Women's Title. John had proposed. In a little more than a full day, Trish had gone from dancing on the top of the world, to drowning at the bottom of the barrel.

The sky broke, dropping angry drops of rain to the ground below, but she barely noticed. The crying heavens were the closest thing her face would feel to tears, she had determined. She was not a weak, little girl who cried over stupid boys, and she wasn't going to start now, no matter who the boys were. Let Dave have his stupid, stable future with Brandy. And if John really wanted marriage and a family, he could find it somewhere else. She wasn't ready for that and she wasn't about to be strong-armed into it by some hard-bodied, super-sweet man she was head-over-heels in love with.

_Look at Trish Stratus. Running for her life. Scared shitless. About to tap out to fear. You're pathetic, Trisha._ The thoughts attacked her so quickly that she had to sit. Lowering herself to the nearest bench, she watched the fountain exploding in the distance and swallowed the lump in her throat.

_I am not scared of anything. I'm not scared of anyone. That's bull shit. I never run away from a fight. I never back down when I know what I want. I am not scared_. She tried to combat the inner-dialogue, but her brain was at war now, ready to argue until she surrendered.

_You're terrified. You're scared to death of loving him. You're scared that you can't be enough. You're scared that he's going to realize that you're not everything he thinks you are._

_Why the hell would I be scared of loving him? He's the best thing that ever happened to me. He loves me for the spirited, spontaneous woman that I am. He loves everything about me. Why would I be scared of loving someone like that?_ She stood from the bench, steeling her resolve to win this conflict as she started back toward the hotel.

_You've had your entire life planned since you were twelve, Trish. Career first, then love, then a family. Wrestling, man, kids. Always been that way in your head, kid. And now the man is here, and it doesn't fit your time table, and you're scared to veer off the path. You're scared to go out of order. You're scared that you want to._

_You're scared that you want to marry him. You're scared that you're willing to give up everything right now if it means that you can be with him. And you are terrified that you know I'm right._

She let out a loud scream and shoveled a handful of wet hair from her face. She didn't care that her make up was running and that she probably looked like a crazy person, standing in the middle of the empty street, screaming at the rain. She didn't care what anyone thought of her anymore. She just wanted the voices to stop. And she wanted them to stop being right.

By the time she ran out of breath and stopped screaming, a black sports car had pulled up beside her in the street. The driver's tinted window slid down and he smirked knowingly at the small woman, barely standing against the angry downpour. "What the hell do you want?" she snapped.

Nodding his head toward the empty passenger's seat, Dave motioned for her to get in the car. "I'll tell you what I don't want. I don't want you to get pneumonia and die in the middle of the Vegas Strip," he smiled.

She rolled her eyes, her hands on her hips. "I thought you were done playing games with me," she challenged, rehashing his words from the day before.

But Dave's gaze was steady and his jaw was set. Trish knew, before he opened his mouth, that she wasn't going to win this one. "I am done playing games," he nodded stoically. "Now get in the fuckin' car before I have to get out there and make you."

A bolt of lightening split the sky, causing Trish to jump, but she refused to move any closer to the car. He had made it clear that he wasn't interested in seeing her anymore, and she wasn't about to look like the pathetic lap dog by crawling into his car just to avoid the rain. "I am fine. Why don't you just go back to your little girlfriend and your perfect, stable life, and leave me the hell alone?"

Rolling his eyes, Dave threw the door of the car open and cringed at the feeling of the cold rain on his face. "Dammit, Trish," he growled, lifting her in his massive arms. Even soaking wet, she weighed less than what he benched on a normal basis. "You are makin' me ruin a fuckin' expensive suit, woman," he teased, throwing her into the passenger's seat and slamming the door.

By the time he made it back to the driver's side, Dave's shoulders were soaked and droplets of water slipped from his gelled hair and onto his cheeks. Trish kept her eyes trained on the road, trying her best to ignore the smell of his cologne. Why did he have to smell so damn good? "I don't wanna go back to the hotel," she insisted.

"Why?" If she was going to act like one of his adolescent daughters, then he was going to talk to her like one, even though he knew damned well that she wasn't going to answer him.

Crossing her arms over her chest, Trish noted that he was driving away from the Strip, and the hotel, but bit her lip to keep from asking him why. As far as she was concerned, they had said everything they needed to say to each other the night before. He couldn't keep sleeping with her – it wasn't right – they had other people to think about. He didn't feel right, and since it was just sex, they needed to end it and move on with their lives.

But the silence between them became more than she could bare. Propping her knees against the dashboard of the car, she watched as he directed the car away from civilization and toward a desert, where only the full moon lit their path. She twisted a strand of her long, blonde hair between her fingers and then cleared her throat.

"John asked me to marry him tonight," she finally whispered. "Last night. Whatever."

Dave felt his heart sink to his toes. He knew it was coming, but the admission still made him feel like he'd been punched. "What'd you say?" he asked, though it seemed rather rhetorical.

"Oh, I said yes," Trish said, her voice sincere. "But then I told him I needed to go wander around Vegas alone for awhile, screaming at nothing at all, because I was so fuckin' happy," her tone turned sarcastic as she shot him an eye roll and then looked back out the windshield. "I told him no fuckin' way. We have this really great thing goin', and now he wants to go fuck it up with marriage?"

He didn't know why, when everything inside of him was telling him it was none of his damn business, he felt the need to dig into her commitment issues, but the words popped out before he could stop them. "What is it with you and marriage?" he asked. She turned surprised eyes to him, but he went on. "You've got this twisted idea that marriage ruins relationships," he chuckled to himself and exited off the main road.

"You're right, Dave," Trish retorted sarcastically. "Marriage has been a really great thing for your relationships in the past." As soon as the words were out, she wanted them back. It wasn't fair, and she knew it, but it came out before she had time to reign the thought in.

He didn't speak,only slowed the car to a stop in a secluded stretch of desert. Cutting the engine, he opened the door and inhaled a deep breath of morning air before pocketing the car keys. She was making excuses, shielding herself, and he knew he couldn't force the walls down. But damned if he didn't want to be inside the fortress of her heart more than anything else in the world at that very moment. For all the jerking around and the mind games she played with him, he still wanted her. He still loved her, and it pissed him off.

After what felt like an eternity, she finally climbed out of the car and made her way to his seat in the sand. Lowering tiny frame next to his considerably larger one, Trish pulled her legs up to her chest and rested her chin on her knees. "I'm sorry. That was uncalled for," she admitted, running a finger over the wet sand at her side.

Dave cleared his throat and stared over the horizon. "Do you still love me?" He couldn't believe the words had come out of his own mouth as he shook his head and tossed a handful of sand to the side. "Did you ever?"

She felt like she was going to throw up. How could he even question whether or not she had loved him? And why should she even have to answer a ridiculous question like that? She huffed and then realized that he was waiting for something. "Of course I did," she laughed, as though it were some kind of joke.

And then she turned to meet his eye. It wasn't a joke. The expression on his face said that it was the most serious thing he had ever asked anyone. He needed to know if she still loved him. He was ready to open up, but he needed to know if she was prepared to share the same honesty. Her hand jutted out, seemingly with its own agenda, and her fingers wrapped around his.

He tried his best to mask the million emotions that shot through his body with that one touch. Noticing her shivering for the first time, he let go long enough to wiggle out of his tailored jacket and slid it over her shoulders, but then took her hand again. He didn't care if he said anything else the rest of the day. If he could sit with Trish, alone in the Vegas desert, and just hold her hand, he would be happy.

"I do," she choked the words out around the emotion in her throat. She knew that he was looking at her, but Trish could only watch their entwined hands. "When I told John that I couldn't marry him tonight, it wasn't because I didn't want to get married." She raised her dark eyes to meet his, a thousand unasked questions passing between them. "It's because I can't imagine myself married to anyone but you."

He wanted to pull a diamond out of his pocket and slide it onto her finger. But then his mind remembered that he was a man, and that he wasn't prepared for anything as cheesy, and movie-like, as that. He didn't have a diamond in his pocket, and even if he did? He wasn't about to ask her to marry him right then and there.

His face twisted, and Trish wasn't sure what to make of it. Was he repulsed at the fact that she had just said she wanted to spend her life with him? Or was he confused because the woman now pledging her devotion had, just months ago, walked away from that very prospect? "Not now," she assured him.

Dave's grip on her fingers relaxed, as did his shoulders. "But, Trish," he started.

She put a finger over his lips and shook her head. "I know that you have Brandy now, and that you guys are," she stopped, looking for the right word, "whatever you are," she added with a small smile. "I just thought that you should know that, after we talked last night – or you yelled, would be more accurate, I think – I did a lot of thinking. And I realized that you were right. The sex meant something, Dave. It was like, no matter how much my head said that it was just sex, my heart wasn't buying it."

Letting go of her hand, he stood, trying to clear his own mind. Eight hours ago, he had been sure that his life was on track, that he could be happy with Brandy and that their families could merge into one big, happy union. He had convinced himself that he would never have Trish, and that he was okay with that. And then he had run into John in the hallway of the hotel, taking out the anger of rejection on an innocent soda machine. The younger man didn't know where his ex-girlfriend had gone, and he didn't fuckin' care.

After searching every casino and strip club he could think of, Dave had nearly given up. That's when he had found her, standing in the rain, looking more beautiful than he had ever seen her. That was when he knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that he wasn't close to being over Trish. That was the moment he realized, even drenched and crazy, he loved that woman enough to drop everything and jump through hoops for her, if she would only ask.

But now that it seemed like she was asking, he wasn't sure what to do. How could he turn his back on a sure thing when he had no guarantee that she wouldn't bolt again? How could he put himself, and his girls, through all the drama that came with Trish? And how could he convince his own heart that this was as bad an idea as his head knew it was? "Trish," he sighed, turning back around.

He was going to tell her all of the reasons that they couldn't be together, and she didn't want to hear them. There was only one thing that she needed to know from Dave. And if he said the words, she would throw her arms around his neck and hang on forever. "Do you love me?" He looked shocked. "Did you ever?"

"Listen," he held out his hand and pulled her to her feet, realizing immediately what she was trying to do. "I am the same guy you left six months ago," he reminded. "I'm not gonna tell you how fucking gorgeous you are all the time, even though there's no one on Earth that comes close to your beauty. And I'm not going to call you in the middle of the afternoon just to tell you that I love you, even though I'm so ass-backwards crazy about you that sometimes I feel like I'm losing my mind.

"I don't talk about my feelings, and I'm not comfortable sitting around and speculating about the future," he reminded her. "If you're waiting for me to say the words, Trish, then we should just head back, because I'm not going to. This is who I am," he looked down at himself and then back at her, lowering one of his large hands to her cheek. "If you love me like you claim you do, then you love this guy – the one who will bend over backwards to make sure you have everything you need, and most of what you want – but he doesn't talk."

Like an epiphany, it hit her. Staring into Dave's dark eyes, she realized that it didn't matter. She didn't care if he ever said he loved her, or if he wanted her to quit her job and have ten babies. She didn't care if they never got married, or if they did it as soon as the nearest wedding chapel opened. She loved Dave Batista. She loved him more than her career. She loved him more than all of the dreams and goals she had set for herself. She loved him more than anything.

"You don't have to say it," she conceded, taking both of his hands in hers. "I love you, Dave. And I want to be with you," she added.

Her words filled him like warm coffee on a cold DC morning. They ran down his back, leaving prickly little goose bumps in their wake. They floated around in his head until every other thought was broken into weightless, disconnected bubbles.

People were going to get hurt by this decision. Brandy would be heart-broken, he knew. And he didn't know how John would react if he showed up to the next city to find his ex-girlfriend back with his friend. But Dave was willing to put it all on the line. Truth be told, he always was.

They returned to the car hand-in-hand, neither speaking as Dave headed back toward the city. The drive back to the hotel was silent, save for the soft music of the radio, and Trish's humming. His hand rested on the gear shift, and hers rested atop his, tapping the beat lightly. Neither were sure what happened next, but they both knew that they would face it together.

He stopped the car in the parking garage and turned his hand over, grasping her hand in his palm. "I'm glad your back, Trish," he said honestly, hoping it didn't sound as corny out loud as it sounded in his head.

She leaned over the center console and placed her hands firmly on his cheeks. "Me, too," she winked, moving in until her lips met his. They had kissed a lot over the last month, but this was different. There was nothing guarded or defensive about this kiss. It was full of love, adoration, and respect. It was full of everything Trish had been longing for her entire life.

Pulling back, she licked her lips and then wound her arms around his neck. "Dave?" Her voice came out soft and seductive, causing him to raise an eyebrow. "Just once?"

He growled and then gave her a lopsided grin. "I love you, Trish Stratus."

She giggled and kissed him again. It was a love that scared her beyond belief, and one that was far from the romance novel ideal - but it was the only one that she wanted. Forever.

* * *

_Alright, so the Batista fans stepped it up big time in the last few days - everyone went a little crazy - and this is what we ended up with. But I just wanted the Chain Gang to know that I got an idea for a one-shot the other day, and I'm going to give you a fluffy little Trish and John story next. Maybe it won't make up for this ending, but it'll be something, right? Hope you enjoyed it anyway - can't wait to hear your reviews._

_And thanks again to everyone who reviewed. You guys were insane and great and fabulous and wonderful. I should put two hundred and fifty "thank you"s in here just to get you all back for the reviews, but I loved them all, so I won't. Suffice it to say - you're all the best and I can't wait to write more for you._


End file.
